Gulfport and Biloxi. Two cities that share a common border along the Mississippi Sound but differ greatly in terms of priorities and personality. Gulfport is about industrial sites and downtown development, while Biloxi'S economic development priorities focus on casinos and tourism. The Port of Gulfport is geared towards accomodating large cargo ships coming into dock drop off consumer goods into 18 Wheelers to be transported all across the country (Ship Island being an exception). The harbors scattered around Biloxi are built to accomodate shrimp boats, speedboat races, fishing tournaments and delivery trucks for the seafood processors located all along Biloxi's Back Bay. Gulfport is more Anglo, while Biloxi's population is comprised of numerous ethic groups who migrated there during different periods of its history, to work in the city's heavily labor intensive seafood industry. Growing up in Jackson, when people traveled to the Coast, they went to Gulfport to attend meetings and Biloxi to party. While public corruption in Gulfport has historically been mainly scandal free, gambling took place in Biloxi long before the State Legislature legalized it, and consequently it had aspects of organized crime associated with it. Gulfport is the serious older brother while Biloxi is the mischief, carefree younger brother. Gulfport is Wally. Biloxi is the Beaver. And if you want to take this analogy further, with its closeness to New Orleans, Hancock County is Eddie Haskell while reliable ol' Jackson County is Lumpy.
Once a year these two coastal city sibling rivals, both offspring from the Mother Gulf of Mexico, get to settle their differences face to face and tonight is the night. The venue is the Biloxi High Indians Stadium. While these two programs annually face off in the final regular season game this year the stakes are much higher as the winner will be named Region 4-6A Champions and get a better state playoff seeding. In their short tenures at each school, both Gulfport Coach Mike Justice and Biloxi Coach John Shannon have done remarkable rebuilding jobs as the Admirals of Gulfport come in with a 7-3 record while the Indians are 8-2. This fierce rivalry, which at one time was discontinued for a 10 year period from 1958-1967 due to a fight, has been dominted by the Admirals in recent years. However, Biloxi, which is riding a 6 game win streak in which they have pushed the scoreboard to its limits, comes in as the hotter team and ranked #1 in the Sun Herald, while the physical, grind-it-out Admirals hit a road block last week with a 27-7 loss to Ocean Springs.
The scoring range for the Indians during this six game winning streak goes from a low of 42 points to a high of 63 points. They have obviously improved greatly since the 41-24 thrashing they took from Pascagoula in the Shrimp Bowl season opener. Most impressive has been the play of junior quarterback Jaylen Woullard. Last Friday, in the Indians 56-14 domination over Hancock County, Woullard had an amazing 257 yards rushing on 9 carries with four touchdowns, in addition to completing 10 of 13 passes for 70 yards and two touchdowns. Yes, that's right 257 yards rushing on 9 carries by a quarterback. With those kind of rushing statistics, Woullard makes Michael Vick look like he has the mobility of Peyton Manning.
You know Coach Justice will have the Admirals prepared after last Friday's disappointment. Two weeks ago Gulport brought down #1 D'Iberville with a big thud 45-7. It wouldn't be a surprise if they took down #1 again.
- Win
No comments:
Post a Comment