Gulfport-Petal III features vengeful Admirals. ‘We owe them. We’ll be ready.’
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Gulfport pursues Petal in 7A quarterfinal after an eight-game win streak.
- Petal twice handed Gulfport narrow losses, including a playoff upset that ended 2024.
- Gulfport vows revenge, citing past collapses and late-game failures to correct.
Each team caught in the tracks of Gulfport’s resounding eight-game winning streak has Petal to blame for their demise. And now the currents of the 7A playoffs have dragged the Panthers back into the Admirals’ path for the third time in two seasons.
The two meet in a state quarterfinal on Friday with plenty of bitter history still fresh in the minds of the Region 4-7A champion. Petal ended Gulfport’s 2024 season by stealing a first round playoff game, 20-17, at Milner Stadium.
The Panthers returned in September for a rematch, scored in the final minute and converted a two-point attempt to stun the Admirals, 25-24, for the second time in a four-game span.
“We owe them,” Gulfport’s standout running back Cooper Crosby told the Sun Herald this week. “This time, we’ll be ready.”
The September loss dropped Gulfport to 1-2 in the early season. Its lone win was a 17-14 escape from Laurel where the Admirals gave the ball away five times and had to climb out of a 14-point hole.
It was the following week when Petal marched 80 yards in 15 plays late in the fourth quarter and unknowingly doomed the Admirals’ future opponents. Including itself, if the Admirals have their way.
Third-year coach Blake Pennock hit the reset button following that game and the locker room had its “come to Jesus” moment.
“Monday, we sat down as a team, and we wrote down our whys,” Crosby said. “Why we play football, what got us to play football and what our goal is in football.”
Gulfport traveled to Pascagoula four days later to face a different kind of Panther and promptly dominated every facet of the game on its way to a 53-13 awakening.
And if there was any question to the legitimacy of the result, Gulfport answered it the next week by ending Ocean Springs’ district win streak at 25 and putting itself in the region’s driver’s seat.
“We had to lock in on the right things and make sure we were paying attention to the details of the things that matter,” linebacker Andre Peters said.
Gulfport has only two giveaways in its last eight games: a fumble against D’Iberville and an interception in last week’s 45-7 first-round beating of Northwest Rankin. The latter was the largest playoff win out of the 19 the Admirals have picked up since 1981.
The offense has stirred to life since scoring a modest 23 points per game over the first three. Gulfport has averaged 42.4 points in the last eight games.
Crosby is third in the state in total touchdowns with 34, and quarterback Parker Nettles has completed 69.7 percent of his passes with 16 touchdowns against one interception during the win streak.
“We’re definitely a way better team than we were at the beginning of the season, especially offensively,” Crosby said.
Gulfport’s defense has pitched two shutouts over the last eight and has logged 21 takeaways in that span. That includes seven in just the last two outings.
Peters leads the Mississippi Coast with 125 tackles and Javon Anderson and Deandre Williams are the Coast’s only two teammates with at least seven sacks apiece.
When Peters looks back at the last run-in with Petal, he sees a defense that needed to, and has, come a long way.
“We realized that we had to play faster,” Peters said. “We were a lot slower and weren’t very confident in our reads. Now that we realize our preparation is our separation and how we’ve been working, we got it.”
Petal has had its share of impressive wins since returning home from Gulfport. It beat West Jones by 39 and gave Region 3-7A champ Oak Grove its only loss.
But the Panthers also suffered head-scratching losses to Pearl (3-7) and Northwest Rankin (6-5), both at home.
For the seniors that have rejuvenated the Gulfport program under Pennock, this will be their final home game regardless of outcome, so long as Oak Grove handles Brandon. The opportunity to reflect on where they started and where they are now isn’t one likely to evade them.
“We were coach Pennock’s first group and that’s what he preached when he first got here, was changing the culture,” Crosby said. “We’ve seen a big jump from previous Gulfport teams. We’re doing things other Gulfport teams haven’t done. I think (Friday) is a huge opportunity, especially with this being the last year we play at Milner.”
Gulfport and Petal will kick off Friday at 7 p.m. with legacy, revenge and a ticket to the South State championship on the line.
“We’re putting on for the entire city and changing the culture,” Peters said.
