Resilience. Love. These are just some of the words coach Deion Sanders used in his post game presser on Saturday. Not to mention, his Jackson State squad broke a 16-game losing streak to Grambling. The streak stood as the longest in FCS to date until the win over Grambling 33-28.
Deion Sanders has Jackson’s Back
Sanders was quick to acknowledge the significance. And that teams in the SWAC are aware of their existence in a way only Deion Sanders can. “I think they know we here,” Sanders said last weekend in a media session. “I think they know we present. Ya know back in the day when they called roll, you’d say ‘here. We are here.’”
The Jackson State Tigers indeed are present, and the best recruiting class in the FCS haven’t even touched the field. Make no mistake, they aren’t going anywhere anytime soon. All the new recruits won’t have eligibility till the 2021 fall season. And that fall team stands greater than some of the FBS schools as far as recruiting classes go. At present, the 2021 class is ranked 86th which is close to South Carolina and Arizona.
That’s the football side of it. Football carries a lot of weight in small towns in the Deep South. Surely, even Sanders would admit, it was his identity back when he was playing in the NFL on Sundays.
The Real Battle in Jackson
That was then. Currently, Sanders finds himself in a unique position. Of course, he’s a first year coach with a team of little history of dominance in the HBCU world. Even more importantly, he has totally immersed himself into the city of Jackson. Along with that comes all the dire circumstances facing the residents there.
No one saw it coming. The winter storm terrorized most of the south is still prolonging the pain in Jackson. Water shortages, boil advisories, government failures and the all familiar blame game. All of it together make for pure hell in a town with 80% African Americans struggling to get by.
Some search for water so they can flush the toilet. Others are looking to simply have water to bathe in. And the blame game continues.
Governor of Mississippi Tate Reeves spoke earlier in the week. “I do think it’s really important that the city of Jackson start collecting their water bill payments before they start going and asking everyone else to pony up more money.”
The comments are just a snippet in the back and forth between politicians looking for a scapegoat to blame for the disaster. All the rhetoric seems too familiar. Perhaps the situation is more complex than Katrina, but the sounding board of useless comments do little good as the residents suffer.
Solutions Versus Problems
Still, the bickering of government officials dominate the headlines to a bigger story of coming up with a solution.
The fact of the matter is, politicians on both sides waste time every time they open their mouths. Nothing productive happens when opposing sides look for the spotlight to point out the others failures.
The public knows. The media knows. Deion Sanders understands he can’t fix everything too. But at least he has his team going to nursing homes and offering help to seniors with no one to speak for them. Sanders is trying to win football games — yes. And just maybe, he doesn’t even know how much an impact he’s making in just a short period of time.
Unfortunately, the story doesn’t have a happy ending right now. The only thing people have is resilience. Resilience is a word Sanders used quite a bit in his post game presser mentioning the struggles in the city. Hopefully, someone will hear the calls for assistance. For now, the city can only keep believing this will end soon.
