Published: November 03, 2009 10:20 pm      

Black, Jones, Tilley, Perkins recognized for efforts

By Jay Neal

sports@jacksonvilleprogress.com



Jacksonville head coach Steve Wells announced the Tribe’s players of the week for the Kilgore game Tuesday morning, and mathematically speaking, the honors were distributed in an unconventional way.

Two players — quarterback, Ryan Black, and running back, Justin Jones, share the Offensive Player of the Week award while the entire defensive unit has been singled out for their outstanding play against the Bulldogs, a game Jacksonville won 28-10 last Friday in Kilgore.

“Coach (Michael) Bay (Baysinger) and the rest of the defensive coaches wanted to recognize all our defensive players for the job they did last week,” Wells said. “We could talk about every one of them, but some that really stand out are Justin Jones, grading out with 30 points, Ty Sneed at 24, Duke Hamilton with 23 and JaColby Spoon (Scott) had 20 points.

“There were several others too, Jason Robinson had 15 points, Brody Finch and Cory Hamlett each had 14 points and Zach Woodson had 12.”

The point system recognizes all phases of the defensive game such as hurries, forced fumbles, sacks, in addition to unassisted and assisted tackles and is a more comprehensive avenue to measure performance than just by the number of tackles alone.

Tedrick Tilley has been tabbed as the Offensive Lineman of the Week, scoring out at 75 percent while the Warrior of the Week honor goes to Brandon Perkins for his efforts in simulating the Kilgore offense during last week’s practices.

For the first time this season, a special teams player of the week wasn’t named.

“There were a lot of good things that happened for us in the Kilgore game, but one area that I didn’t think we played well in was special teams and we are working hard in practice this week to get those problems corrected, believe me,” Wells said. “We obviously can’t continue to (decide) for a fair catch on punts and have the ball land on the 30 (yard line) and roll all the way to the four; we just give up too much field position in those situations.”

The Fightin’ Indians (7-2, 3-1 in District 14-4A) close out the regular season at 7:30 p.m. Friday by hosting Lindale (5-4, 3-1). The winner of the game will earn the conference championship. Both teams have clinched a post-season berth.