Millington was on center stage last Friday night welcoming residents from Fayette County, Collierville, Arlington, Germantown and Bartlett.
The home of the Trojans hosted the 2017 Shelby County Football Jamboree for the first time. With coordination from the Millington Police Department, Shelby County Sheriff’s Department and Millington Central High School staff, the event ran smoothly with six high schools.
“It looked like a really nice event,” Millington Head Coach Chris Michaels said. “The weather cleared out for us and looked like the crowds were good. It wasn’t hot. I don’t know what happened outside with the parking because parking is tight when you come around here with this size crowd.
“So hopefully everybody got in and out without a hitch,” he added. “Inside the stadium and inside the facilities, I thought everything went off well. We had lots of help. The administration and faculty did a great job of getting everything staffed in here. I thought it was a really nice event.”
Not only motorists wanted to get out of Millington without a hitch but the various head coaches had similar thought about their team’s health. When Millington vs. Houston ended 0-0, both Michaels and Houston Head Coach Will Hudgens expressed the same sentiments.
“Come out healthy,” Hudgens said. “We did do a really good job of getting out competing. It’s a chance to get those young guys under the lights who haven’t had a chance to do it yet. Bring some good energy, come out healthy and compete.
“Nobody is going to write home about but you wanted to come out and have a good showing and show the fans a little something,” he added. “The important thing is both teams came out healthy. We move on to next week and prepare for Brighton.”
While the Mustangs prepare for a Week 1 showdown with the Brighton Cardinals, the Trojans will travel this Friday to start the 2017 season at Bolton.
“We didn’t spend one minute on Houston during the course of the week,” Michaels said. “It was all Bolton. Everything we were doing was early Bolton prep. We told them yesterday at the end of practice we were going to do our base defense and run some of our basic plays on offense.”
Both Houston and Millington had big defensive plays in the final 20-minute quarter of the night leading to a scoreless tie.
The first varsity quarter of the night was between the Collierville Dragons and Arlington Tigers. Collierville prevailed 7-0 behind a Matt Connors touchdown throw to Peyton Murphy from 10 yards out.
The second quarter was played between the Bartlett Panthers and Fayette-Ware Wildcats. Both teams had big plays with the Wildcats striking first. Fayette-Ware running back Tabarius White exploded for a big run to the 1-yard-line. Two plays later Elijah Cox crossed the goal line to make the score 6-0.
On the very next play, the Panthers answered with a 70-yard Preston Raines to JJ Vaden TD pass. Vaden raced down the center of the field for the score. Noah Buckingham added the extra point to give Bartlett the 7-6 win.
The Panthers start Week 1 at Overton. The Wildcats begin 2017 vs. Memphis Academy of Science and Engineering.
The Collierville Dragons travel to Olive Branch for Week 1 and the Arlington Tigers will be in Memphis this Friday at Raleigh-Egypt. All games kickoff at 7 p.m.
THOMAS SELLERS JR. is the editor of The Millington Star. Contact him at (901) 433-9138 or thomas.sellers@journalinc.com.
