A lot of coaches would want to burn the film and bury the ashes deep after losing by 48 points.
Vicksburg’s Tim Hughes was eagerly looking forward to watching it early Saturday morning.

Greg Evans scored three touchdowns, and Hunter Hulsey threw three touchdown passes as Clinton routed Vicksburg 48-0 on Friday night. Rather than being frustrated by the lopsided outcome, however, Hughes said there was a lot the Gators could learn from as they moved forward.

“The mistakes that were made are things the coaches are emphasizing, and they’re going to see it. There’s going to be these teaching points,” Hughes said. “I would have loved to have seen those same mistakes last week, so we could have corrected them. Now we have a chance to do that.”

Friday’s game was Vicksburg’s first of the season, after last week’s regularly-scheduled opener against Clarksdale was canceled because of severe weather. Clinton had gone on the road to beat South Panola, and it didn’t take long to see which team was more in the flow of the season.

Evans scored on a touchdown run on Clinton’s first drive, and then Hulsey went to work. He threw a touchdown pass to Tyree Carr, and then a 43-yarder to Desmond Baker following a turnover to put the Arrows ahead 21-0 midway through the first quarter.

“They’re a good team, and they took advantage of the things we were insufficient at,” Hughes said. “We have sophomores all over the field, and that’s who they went after. We adjusted some things we had to do. We had a good defensive series going, and then gave up a third-and-long and they scored two touchdowns in three offensive snaps.”

Evans caught a touchdown pass from Hulsey in the second quarter and Tucker Barefoot kicked a 44-yard field goal as Clinton went ahead 31-0 at halftime. Evans added a 10-yard touchdown run and Torrey Johnson a 30-yard TD run in the second half. Barefoot also kicked another field goal.

Although the Gators never threatened to make a game of it after the first quarter, Hughes said he did see enough positive plays here and there to take an optimistic view of the night.

“The reality is, it wasn’t pretty. The reality is, it’s going to get better,” Hughes said. “The kids handled it with a lot of maturity, and they could see some good things happening. I think they’ll be ready to come back Monday and see how much better they can get.