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Golden Lions face the top team from SWAC | The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

After celebrating its homecoming a week ago with a victory over the last-place team in the Southwestern Athletic Conference, the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff will make a bid for them at the top of the league.

Jackson State (6-2, 4-0) will host the Golden Lions for their homecoming at Mississippi Veterans Memorial Stadium in Jackson, Miss., at 2 p.m. It will be the third time this season that UAPB (3-5, 2-2) has been a homecoming opponent. The first two times did not go as the Golden Lions had hoped.

UAPB fell to Alcorn State 38-28 and Grambling State 31-21 last month, but was within striking distance late in the fourth quarter of both games.

In their own home game, the Golden Lions were the ones to pull away in the final 15 minutes to outlast winless Mississippi Valley State 35-21.

“It was good for us to be back on the field,” UAPB coach Alonzo Hampton said. “I told the guys all week that we knew what we were about. Mississippi Valley, they play hard, they’re just like us, guys with a chip on their shoulder. So we knew it was going to be a physical game.

“They came out and actually took it to us early in the game. It was a good thing the rain came. We were able to get back in and get back on track.”

There was a lengthy weather delay that halted play in the first half, but the teams continued to battle after play resumed. The Delta Devils took a 21-14 lead just after halftime before the Golden Lions scored 21 unanswered points, including 14 in the fourth, to maintain and surpass last year’s win total.

“I’m happy for our program, happy for our kids,” said Hampton, whose team has won three games at home. “I’m still trying to learn how to win.”

The learning curve was evident in the losses at Alcorn State, a game in which UAPB led 14-0, and at Grambling State. Now the Golden Lions hit the road again in what they believe will be their toughest SWAC test yet.

Jackson State, ranked No. 23 in the FCS, has won four straight games and leads the SWAC East Division. The Tigers have defeated UAPB three times in a row and have won seven of the last eight meetings.

“I heard someone say before that this is the reason we keep getting scheduled for the home game, because people think you’re an easy win,” Hampton said. “We don’t need it for motivation. At the end of the day, as a competitor, you want to beat the guy in front of you. We’re trying to get that mentality for our players and our coaches and everyone involved in this program.

“When you cross that line, it’s me versus you. The teams we’ve played have kind of put it on us, and we just haven’t been able to stay consistent for four quarters. Last week was a It wasn’t much different, because we actually won the fourth quarter, but in those two conference games that we lost on the road, the other team made more plays than us.”

Of the Tigers’ 36 offensive touchdowns this season, 16 have traveled 20 yards or more. They average 35.6 points and 199 yards rushing, both No. 1 in the SWAC. Irv Mulligan leads the league in rushing with 568 yards on 84 carries, and Jacobian Morgan, who threw five touchdowns against UAPB in last season’s 40-14 win, is fourth in passing with 1,374 yards and 11 touchdowns.

“I’ll be honest, Jackson State is probably the best football team we’ve played since the University of Central Arkansas,” Hampton said. “Coach (TC Taylor) has done a really good job at Jackson State. They are big on the offensive line, they have about three running backs, possibly four.

“The quarterback looks really good, they have receivers. … They look like a Group of Five school. We played them when I was at (Louisiana-Monroe), and we beat them 12-9 or something like that (in 2021), but a few of those kids actually played for us at ULM. So hats off to them, they did a really good job and that’s why they’re leading that side of the conference.

Taylor is in his second season as the Tigers’ head coach after Deion Sanders left to take over at Colorado, but he has been a fixture at Jackson State for years. He broke the school’s single-season receiving record in 2001 when we named an All-American.

He has maintained the winning culture that Sanders helped restore during his three-year stint when he led the Tigers to two SWAC titles, but Taylor plans to take the games one game at a time.

“As a program, I talk to these coaches and these players,” he said. “We don’t look past every opponent. It’s about making adjustments and not slipping in these football games. Play every opponent the same, play our physical football, execute as a unit in attack, defense and special teams.

“We know it’s a homecoming here in Jackson, but like I told the team, homecoming is for the fans. We’ve got to go out here and win another conference football game and take care of business.”

UAPB had the same mentality going into the matchup with Mississippi Valley State, and will look to do the same against Jackson State, albeit as a visitor.

“We have our work cut out for us,” Hampton said. “We’re going to have to stop the run. That’s what they do. They’ve been able to run the ball to everyone, and we’re kind of bent, don’t break.”

“We’re going to get a few more bodies back on defense, and we need them. We’ve literally taken down bodies, even in the last week. People were able to run the ball on us, but God showed us a little mercy, and we were able to make some plays when we needed to make them.

(FINAL MEETING)

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