Coach Jesse Little now has three football championships out of the five years he has coached at Marengo Academy.

Last Friday, Coach Little’s Longhorns met MA’s former coach, Chris Burford of Wilcox Academy, on the Troy State University playing field and emerged victorious.

“They were all real nervous going into the game, they told me they were. That’s probably why our first half didn’t go so good,” Little said.

The first half of play for the championship game saw the Longhorns give up five turnovers to trail Wilcox 16-7 going into half-time.

“We made some adjustments on offense and defense and we just came out and played better ball in the second half,” Little said.

The Longhorns were at a disadvantage going into the game. Wilcox had an undefeated season and had defeated the Longhorns earlier in the year. Coach Burford knew the Longhorn team well after coaching them himself for the last five years, but little said this was a whole new ball game.

“Every time we’ve ever gone to a championship game we’ve won. We’re 6 for 6 for championship games in football,” he said. “These boys have a lot of heart.”

Little said the MA squad adjusted well in the second half of play and were able to run up an unanswered 16 points on Wilcox before the final buzzer. The winning tradition at Marengo Academy can be traced back to the ’60’s when the Linden Blue Devils took the field, Little said.

“We have great community support for this team and I think that comes from some of those Blue Devil players and fans continuing to support their family and friends and just raising great bunch of kids,” Little said.

With one more title on his shelf, what’s next for Jesse Little’s Longhorns?

“We’ll just pack it up and get ready to do it again next year,” he smiled.