Except for a handful of state champions and the unfortunate teams that don’t make the post-season, every high school team in the nation ends its season with a loss.

The scene is always the same. While one team celebrates wildly and players rush to the sidelines to embrace friends and family, another team mills about, not sure what to do.

Some stare with disbelief at the scoreboard. Some fall on hands and knees, heads on the ground. Some simply weep.

The old team immediately becomes a new team. Underclassmen begin to rally, promising better things for next year. Seniors are no longer a part of this new team.

It sounds sad, I know. In a way, it is, I guess. But those seniors do move on to other things. Those underclassmen do form a new team, and they become that team’s new leaders. The stinging loss becomes a motivating tool for next year.

That same loss does not affect the seniors in the same way. Oh yeah, it still stings – at first. But it fades, if not in clarity but intensity, just like any other memory. It becomes a part of the high school football experience, part of a group of memories that I, at least consider among my favorite. Essentially, life goes on.

Ferriday’s season – and the Miss-Lou football season – officially ended with the Trojans’ loss to Farmerville. Ferriday has absolutely nothing to regret. Those players will undoubtedly have better and wider variety of memories than most of us, and they will be remembered as one of the better teams in that school’s history.

But no team in the area has anything of which to be ashamed.

Adams County Christian School started out an abysmal 0-5. A lot of teams would have imploded. Players would have quit, fights with the coaches would have divided the team and fans would have abandoned them.

None of that happened. An outstanding coaching staff coupled with strong senior leadership starting producing wins. What Rebel coach Bo Swilley considered divine intervention (and what the MPSA considered a Silliman eligible player violation) helped ACCS to the post-season.

Huntington had a new coach for the third straight year and was expected to finish at the bottom of the division. The Hounds had other plans, and finished district runners-up, also taking an unlikely trip to the playoffs.

Trinity started the season with equally low expectations. With a diminutive team in both physical size and numbers, the Saints fought through injuries to improve from last year. The greatest accomplishment for Trinity, though, was the play of arguably the most talented freshman class in the area, which promises good things to come.

Natchez faced one of the toughest schedules in the state and the Bulldogs’ record unfortunately did not show the team’s improvement from last year.

Vidalia lost 20 seniors from last year’s team, many in key positions, and still remained competitive with a brutal schedule in an incredibly tough district.

Cathedral began the year as bad as a team could – winless. Although young and inexperienced, the Green Wave rallied at the end, finishing the season with two wins and momentum to carry over into next year.

As I said, life goes on. So does football. It was a good season, and I can’t wait for next year.

Nick Adams is sports editor of The Natchez Democrat. He can be reached at (601) 445-3632 or e-mailed at nick.adams@natchezdemocrat.com.