When coach Thomas White first walked inside the locker room at Warren Central Junior High, he wasn’t expecting to be looking up at his middle school players.
“When I first came here, I had been on a diet and was down to 180 pounds. When I walked in, the kids were bigger than I was,” White said laughing. “I said, ‘these are 7th and 8th graders?’ I wasn’t quite used to that.”
Four years after his arrival, White has taken the kids who towered over him and turned them into champions. WCJHS won the Little Six championship this season, beating Terry in the final game to claim a title that has eluded the program since 2000.
“To beat all the top teams, it felt great,” 8th grade defensive lineman Tyral Smith said. “Since we came back to go undefeated, I’ll be honest, after the Terry game I started crying. It felt real good.”
For the past two seasons, Warren Central’s high school has boasted one of the fiercest defenses in Mississippi, and it looks like things are only going to get better with the new crop that will soon arrive. The junior high team was not scored on defensively all season long and has picked up the mentality of the varsity squad with a prodigious aplomb.
“Defense wins championships. That’s how it goes,” Smith said. “If you have a good offense and no defense, you’re not going to win. Defense wins championships, offense puts up points.”
Offensive lineman McKinley Skipper echoed those sentiments, saying the key to winning it all was finding a combination of triumph in the classroom and on the field that translated into success in both areas.
“Listen at practice. Listen to what your coaches say,” he said. “You’ve got to have good grades and you’ve got to want it more than the other team wants it.”
After disposing of Terry to win the trophy, the players doused their coach with a Gatorade bath and soaked in the historic win. It was a feeling that will stay with them as they make the transition to high school, and one they hope to replicate at the next level soon.
“It hasn’t happened in 14 years. It’s just a big deal to us,” quarterback Wesley Ricks said. “We were just so excited. I remember Coach (White) was excited. We dumped him and got him all wet. It was just crazy.”
Warren Central’s 8th graders carried the team and — in White’s mind — were the reason WCJHS was able to secure a Little Six championship for the first time in 14 years.
“These 8th graders were fantastic,” he said. “They wanted to win. That’s what they wanted to do is win Little Six. They came out here and worked at it and they did it.”