The Southwest Mississippi Community College football coaches have had their hands full figuring out where this year's recruiting class was going to come from.
With a lot of young teams in the recruiting district and with a lot of seniors qualifying for four-year schools and receiving offers, Southwest still has to play a waiting game, but also had to find players from outside the district.
“Twelve of 21 qualified and are receiving offers,” Southwest head coach Charles Anthony said. “We’re waiting on decisions, but most are going to be out of district.”
The Bears lost about every defensive back or wide receiver that saw significant time this past season and had to find replacements.
Darren Airline, Travis King, Tony Mitchell and Devorris Stanton all signed as wide receivers, with Airline the only in-district recruit.
Dezman Ivory, could go either way, playing wide receiver or defense, depending on whether the defensive backs still on the fence choose Southwest.
Up front on the defense, Anthony feels good with his players in school and those coming, but he's leaving a spot for an out of state defensive lineman to add to the unit.
“We feel pretty good at linebacker and defensive line and we added some players to it,” Anthony said.
The offense will have two quarterbacks in camp this spring and will also have two running backs. That should help solidify the backfield and keep the quarterbacks from playing musical chairs like they had to this season.
Filling most of the holes came from getting out and finding players scattered around the south side of Mississippi.
Players from Vicksburg to the coast were tracked down by a full staff that Southwest didn’t have last offseason with assistant coaches changing jobs.
“It was critical to get out of district,” Anthony said. “(Offensive coordinator David )Thornton was able to go into Jones, Pearl River and Gulf Coast and get some guys, (offensive line coach Jason) Underwood got some from Hinds and Holmes’ district and we got a few out of Co-Lin’s district.”
Southwest will have tryouts on Wednesday to find a kicker and long snapper and will further sort out who they will offer scholarships to on Feb. 25 with tryous for the other positions.
