The Gentry Post Game Speech- October 1997

Everytime I drive to Greenville to my grandparents' house and pass through Indianola and see Gentry High School, I think about this game. It stands out for the following reasons:

• We were coming off a season where we had just lost to Starkville in the state 5A quarterfinals, and had made state headlines by having the toughest non-conference schedule in the entire state of Mississippi, and at the time, we were ranked #7 in Clarion-Ledger Super 10 poll. So, WHY did Gentry schedule us for homecoming that night? This made for a very hostile crowd and I remember walking to the field from the locker room I was hearing all kinds of threats.
• Along with this, the school is in right in the middle of the worst part of town- really didn't feel safe.
• The field was hard as a rock, had grass way too long, and it was absolutely freezing.
• Anthony Bennett had quit the week before and this was Chris Purvis's first start for us that year.
• Johnny Pate left the team for two weeks and Justin Shannon quickly became the alternate receiver behind Jerome Geralds who started this game along with Larry Hollins.
• Justice had received alot of heat from parents and boosters for not playing enough of the second teamers in blowouts, and I remember him getting booed towards the end of this game by several parents after we had the game locked up.
• Keith, Ben Strain, and I spotted "Val Venis" who was the Line Judge on our side who may have been hung more than any human being I've ever seen.
  
• Those of us on the scrub bus in this game got to have an adventure with Coaches Lacey, Sligh, and Nutter because we got lost.....twice.
• Dan Tarsi was then upset when he spotted 4 deer in the distance and we didn't stop so we could kill them.
  

Ok, after all that, we played the first bad game in a two game bad game stretch that year. Anthony Ephrom threw 3 picks, including back to back picks in a very strange 3 straight plays with interceptions sequence in which Derrick Garner picked off the middle pass between the two Ephrom interceptions. We pulled away at the very end when Nathan Rives intercepted a pass to ice the game, and we pulled out a 42-20 victory in a game that was alot closer than the final score. That, along with several questionable calls, an inexperienced tailback, and two key players quitting the team, may have prompted Justice to have what was to me his most memorable post game speech of all time. As you know, usually these speeches were just things for the press and parents to see as kind of a "movie moment" for people outside our team to see. They also were NEVER filled with any cussing......until tonight.

Justice, who was openly frustrated let loose the following speech:

"We ain't a very good football team...........................................long pause.....................We AIN'T a very good football team........................................another long pause......................WE AIN'T A VERY GOOD FOOTBALL TEAM!!!!! We play like we played tonight and we call ourselves a "playoff team"? We thought we could come up here tonight and just goof around and beat this team and we almost let them beat us! What, you think you can just show up and whip people in 5A? Let me tell ya something, jack, if you think that's the case, you are sadly mistaken! Monday afternoon as soon as we get there in the fieldhouse, you're either in the film room or in the weight room. No more joking around! At 1:45 you BE your ass in one of those rooms! Everybody up, let's pray."

He never ceased to amaze me.