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Southwest Mississippi Community College

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Jonathan McNair vs. East Miss.
Chuck Barnes

Football Michael D. Gunnell, Southwest Sports Information

Home standing Bears fall to top-ranked East Mississippi in season-opener

Totaling almost 600 yards of total offense, the East Mississippi Lions showed Thursday night why they are the nation's top-ranked juco team as they opened the 2014 football season with a 52-14 win over the home standing Southwest Bears.
 
"We did some good things," said Southwest head coach Tucker Peavey, "but obviously not enough. The biggest disappointment to me was we did some very undisciplined things. You're not going to be very good and you're not going to beat a good team whenever you make those kinds of mistakes. That's my fault."
 
The Lions took the opening kickoff and needed only 2:36 to march down the field and take a 7-0 lead. Quarterback Chad Kelly closed out the nine-play drive with a two-yard touchdown toss to Camion Patrick. Drew White booted the extra point.
 
Taking the ensuing kickoff, the Bears responded with an excellent 11-play drive, capped by a seven-yard De'Angelo Ballard to Ladarrius Slocum scoring pass with 3:19 to play in the quarter. Reed James PAT kick knotted the game at 7-7 at the end of the opening stanza.
 
The Lions exploded for 24 points in the second quarter on two touchdown passes and a scoring run by Kelly. White added three PAT's and a 28-yard field goal to put the visitors on top 31-7 at the half.
 
The third quarter also belonged to the Lions. Kelly tossed his fourth touchdown pass of the night while Preston Baker ran for a score and Demetrius Cain returned an interception for another touchdown. White added the extra points to put the defending national champions up 52-7 with 15:00 to play.
 
The Bears picked up the final points of the game with 7:56 left on the clock when Ballard connected with Slocum again, this time for a 28-yard scoring pass. James added the PAT to round out the scoring.
 
Ballard completed 11 of 20 passes on the night for 194 yards with two touchdowns and two interceptions. Slocum caught three passes for 51 yards and two scores while Kameron Williams had five catches for 85 yards. Chris Jones led the Bears' ground game with 15 carries for 59 yards.
 
The Bears totaled 12 first downs in the game and were penalized four times for 38 yards. Brandon Mancuso punted five times for a 37.8 yard average.
 
Kelly completed 27 of 36 passes for 322 yards and four touchdowns to top the Lions' offense. He also ran for a touchdown.
 
The Lions had 29 first downs in the game and were whistled for 90 yards on nine penalties. White averaged 42.5 yards on two punts.
 
Peavey said the team will now take a look at what their mistakes were in the game. "Teams generally make their biggest improvements between week one and week two," he said, "So it's going to be how do our players approach it. We know what we're going to do as coaches and if our players take it like they ought to then we're going to be a better football team next Thursday."
 
The Bears return to action on September 4 when they host the Mississippi Delta Trojans in a 7:00 contest. The Trojans picked up a 21-12 opening-game win over East Central.
 
 
 
 
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