FOOTBALL PICKS: While most teams are in the playoffs, winless Liberty goes bowling

Sometimes when a program wants to see success it hasn’t seen in a while, it needs a leader willing to think and act outside the box of what’s “normal” in the sport.

We may be seeing that happen this week.

And it’s reminiscent of what an SEC program did over 20 years ago when they were hit with sanctions from the NCAA including a two-year bowl ban.

I don’t know how many true Alabama fans there are that read The Jackson Post (if you weren’t an Alabama fan before 2009, then I will question if you’re a true fan). But in 2001, true Alabama fans will remember when the NCAA threw its rulebook at the Crimson Tide program (Tennessee fans will remember it too because the rulebook was thrown after then-Tennessee coach Phillip Fulmer snitched on Alabama).

But when they were hit with the two-year bowl-ban, someone inside the program - then-head coach Dennis Franchione, athletic director Mal Moore, or someone else - had a genius idea. This was when NCAA football still technically had an 11-game regular season but they’d allowed a 12th game for a couple years because there was an extra Saturday on the calendar between Labor Day weekend and the first weekend in December when conference championships were played.

(Yes, I’m getting to Madison County high school football. Bear with me.)

If they couldn’t play a bowl game, they could schedule a pair of road trips the week after they played Auburn in the Iron Bowl that would resemble a bowl game.

And that’s just what they did. Two years in a row in 2002 and 2003, Alabama didn’t end its regular season against Auburn. It ended its regular season at Hawaii. It gave Alabama an extra week of practice for its younger players (which was really needed with the scholarship reduction), and the players got to enjoy a long trip to end the season.

Liberty head coach Robert Gillard has done the same thing for the Crusaders. No, they’re not taking a season-ending trip to Hawaii. 

Instead they’re going to Bruceton for a bowl game against the Tigers.

This is something that’s not done nearly as much as it used to be since TSSAA football expanded to nine total classes between Division I and II and a grand total of 230 teams making the playoffs (I did the math, and that’s the actual number of teams).

But teams that don’t make the playoffs have always had the option to play a bowl game, and Gillard is doing that with the Crusaders.

Will they end their losing streak? Maybe, but it’s not an automatic just because Liberty is a 3A school playing a 1A school. Their roster sizes are about the same size.

Do they have the opportunity to get better this week? Most certainly because three or four more practices are better than none.

So good luck again to the Crusaders.

Here are my picks for Week 12 of high school football season after I went 4-2 last week (I’m proud of picking the University School of Jackson win but failed to get South Side’s win correct so congratulations to the Hawks for ending their season on a high note and giving me a loss) for a season record of 41-19 so far:

Jackson Central-Merry 35, Summertown 21: If you read The Post Route, you see a mention of not many teams in the southern part of Middle Tennessee that throw the ball as much as JCM does. That can be the key to a win for the Cougars. But they’ve got to smack them in the mouth early and often with touchdown passes to get a cushion on the scoreboard and then fight off the comeback try late.

North Side 39, Station Camp 20: The Indians apparently need to hold their opponents to no more than three touchdowns to beat them. So this score isn’t so much about how many North Side scores as it is about how many they can hold Station Camp to. But the defense will have to work hard for this one and not let it get away like they did last week.

Trinity Christian 42, First Assembly Christian School 10: That’s the exact same score from the first time these teams played less than a month ago. I’ve got no reason to think TCA will let up any, especially after tasting a bitter defeat last week that they want to cleanse their palette of. So unless FACS is going to bring some big wrinkles on both sides of the ball TCA’s coaches haven’t seen on film at all, the Lions should win this one - maybe even with a mercy rule running clock.

Webb School 35, USJ 28: This is one I legitimately hope I’m wrong about. This is almost like USJ is the college team that fought hard to win the Big 12 - a respected conference - but now they go play the fifth-place team from the Southeastern Conference. USJ had a tough schedule this year, but how many of their opponents had five players with NCAA FBS attention? How many of those opponents scored 50 or more points four times? One thing that will get underrated this week - including by me - is USJ’s defense and the coaching staff’s ability to get the players in the best position to succeed. But slowing this offense down will be one of the toughest things they’ve had to do this year.

Liberty 8, Bruceton 6: This game will happen like the Scotts Hill game, except the ending. Liberty gets the 2-point conversion in overtime and keeps the Tigers out of the end zone to break their losing streak.

Brandon Shields, brandon@jacksonpost.news