After a tough football season, Arrows look ahead
By Danny C. Davis
Prior to the 2023 football season, most were cautiously optimistic about the upcoming season. Despite losing a lot of key starters on both sides of the ball and having arguably the toughest schedule in all seven classifications in the Mississippi High School Activities Association, everyone felt Clinton had a chance to have a very good season and make it to the playoffs for the fourth consecutive year.
Although the Arrows had lost to graduation from the 2022 squad QB Jordan Batte, running back Jakobe Calvin and wide out Kyler Huton, who all three accounted for most of the high-scoring offense a year before, CHS had newcomers who were expected to equal or exceed.
Defensively, despite the loss of two three-year starters at linebackers, Jacquavyian Carter and Kamarious Gibson, the Arrows still looked to be pretty good on defense. Returning on the front defensive line was University of Alabama Birmingham commit Jonathan Flowers. Also returning up front was T.J. Spann. Both Flowers and Spann were two-year starters on the Arrow defensive line. And the most experienced defensive back, Veshone Malone, also returned.
Senior QB Sam Semi had transferred to Clinton from Plano, Texas, after starting in Texas for two seasons. The plan was for rising sophomore QB Josef Walker and Semi to split snaps at quarterback. Junior Jakobe Williams was expected to pick up the slack at running back where running back Jakobe Calvin left off a year before.
But injury problems began in preseason and continued through all of the next ten games.
Walker would suffer a shoulder injury in preseason and would not be available again until game seven against Starkville.
Then, in the first game at Warren Central, on the game’s fifth play, Flowers suffered a torn ACL following a fumbled punt after the Arrow defense had forced WC three and out. That was one of the biggest blows to the young Arrow defense for the remainder of the season, and CHS fell to WC 28-7.
The next week, CHS fell to Northwest Rankin 21-14 in a one possession lost game that could have gone the other way.
But, on September 8, Clinton suffered the largest blow of the season at Brandon. The Arrows only trailed Brandon 17-10 and were driving when Semi suffered a serious ankle injury with just a minute left in the half. With Walker, the backup QB still out, the Arrows were forced to turn to senior wide receiver/defensive back Veshone Malone, who had not taken a snap at QB since junior high. The Arrows did not score again and fell 31-10.
Game four was at Grenada, the most improved team in Class 6A. The Arrows fell 35-0, and that was with a running clock from about the middle of the third period.
The following week, CHS was still struggling on offense and fell to another top Class 6A team at home, South Panola, 26-11. But the Arrow offense played hard and could have won the game, if it were not for two turnovers.
On September 29, CHS put it all together, with Malone and Williams sparking the offense, and the Arrows got their first win over a very good Terry team for homecoming, 28-21.
Game seven was at Starkville; and, with the return of QB Josef Walker, Clinton jumped ahead of the Yellow Jackets 21-14 early in the game. But Starkville’s QB-wide receiver connection of Trey Petty and Braylon Burnside was just too much in the second half, and CHS fell 60-21 with a fourth period running clock.
Next, Clinton returned home to face top-5 ranked opponent Tupelo. Walker suffered another injury during the preceding week, and Semi returned for the first time in five weeks at QB.
The Arrows played one of their best games of the season and, behind Semi and Williams, CHS jumped to a surprising 28-21 lead in the third period. But two turnovers late in the game led to a 42-28 Golden Wave win.
Despite having a 1-7 record, the Arrows could still clinch a playoff spot with a win at home over Germantown. In a game that went back and forth for the entire four quarters, Germantown scored late to win, 42-35.
But, even with a 1-8 season record, the Arrows could still have made the playoffs with a regular season final game win over rival Madison Central.
But once again, bad luck struck at Madison. CHS was trailing only 7-0 in the first quarter and driving to tie the game when both Semi and Malone were injured on the same play.
What were the odds of your starting QB and your backup QB and top defensive back getting injured the same play? The Arrows were forced to go with ninth-grade QB Aaric Beasley, who had only taken a couple of snaps in practice the week before. Beasley played hard and got the Arrows in position to kick a field goal, but the going was tough with the two QBs out.
And the injury to Malone was a double blow, as the Jaguars threw for three consecutive touchdowns and won 35-3 with a running clock in the fourth quarter.
Once again, without those two injuries, the Madison game would have been a more competitive game.
After the game, Arrow head coach Judd Boswell talked to the team about all the adversity the team had been through this season, from preseason until the final game.
“Our team played hard, but we did not get one single break from preseason until our final game,” said Boswell. “Sometimes, football teaches kids about how to handle adversity in life, and we had plenty of that this season.”
Despite the injury-prone hard luck season, the Arrows are looking ahead to next season with optimism.
“We were replacing nine of the eleven starters on offense,” said Arrow offensive coordinator Tyler Peterson. “But losing three quarterbacks to injury was very tough.”
“The good thing is that we played a lot of young players this past season that will be back with experience next year, including Josef Walker at quarterback and Williams at running back, and we will have more experience at receiver and on the offensive line.”
Defensive coordinator Hammer Morgan agreed.
“Losing Jonathan Flowers on the defensive line made things really tough stopping the run and our pass rush the entire season,” said Morgan. “But our kids played hard all season long, no matter what happened and never quit.
“We have a lot of experience coming back with all three linebackers returning, and other players in the secondary returning. We also have some talented guys coming up from the ninth-grade team. We will work hard in the offseason to get better for next year.”
Looking back at the season, the fact is that Clinton lost games to the some of the best teams in Class 6A and Class 7A. Also, Clinton defeated a very good Terry team that was also a playoff team.
Of Clinton’s nine losses, eight of those teams won in the first round of the MHSAA playoffs, and Warren Central, Brandon, Grenada and Starkville all won in the second round of the playoffs Then both Grenada and Starkville played for the state championships in Class 6A and Class 7A.
There was no doubt Clinton played the toughest schedule of any MHSAA classifications in 2023.
