Unfortunately for the ’Hounds, those two plays were exceptions to the typical snaps, which led to eight Tiger touchdowns as compared to the Greyhounds’ three in a 56-21 Stockbridge victory Friday night in Gray.

Trailing 21-0 after allowing the visitors to score touchdowns on their third, fourth, and fifth drives of the game, Jones County scored a pair of touchdowns just 11 seconds apart.

Quarterback Dusty Lanford found receiver Loren Thomas on second-and-9 from the Greyhound 46-yard line for an initial 20-yard gain on the catch and another 35-plus yards after Thomas broke a couple of tackles and used some nifty footwork to elude several Tiger defenders.

“We used a motion formation to get their good safety out of position in the middle of the field, and we came underneath to Loren,” Jones head coach Bill Young said. “He did a great job of running after the catch and got some good downfield blocks.”

Michael Sibley’s extra-point came with 1:39 left in the second quarter.

Upback Kameron Hill took the ensuing kickoff from Kelvin Stone, and after Hill was contacted by Greyhound defenders, he attempted to lateral the ball to the team’s deep return man.

The ill-advised pitch was snatched out of thin air with one hand by Andre Pope and returned about 15 yards for the score.

“That’s one of the plays that will go on Andre’s highlight film,” Young said. “Andre was there to get the ball, and I’m real proud because he knew what to do with it. He got it into the end zone.”

Sibley’s second extra-point of the night came with 1:28 left in the second quarter.

But the Jones defense allowed the Stockbridge offense to march down the field, breaking off chunks of 17, 7, 12, 11, and 12 yards on five plays that would set up to a 21-yard screen play from quarterback Tyler Bass to running back Rashad White for a touchdown with just over 10 seconds until halftime.

A 28-14 lead would expand to 56-14 by the 5:35 mark in the fourth quarter as the Tigers continued to break off big chunks of yardage. Twenty-five of the Tigers’ offensive snaps resulted in gains of double-digit yardage in the contest.

A big contributing factor to Stockbridge’s many big plays in the contest was around 35 missed tackles by the Jones defense.

In comparison to the Tigers’ offensive numbers, 28 percent – 13 of the ’Hounds’ 45 snaps – went for negative plays, which include losses of yardage, penalties, and turnovers.

“Right now we’re just not playing very good football on either side of the ball,” Young said.

A rash of injuries that has knocked out around a quarter of the Greyhounds’ line-up of regular contributors on both sides of the ball over much of the second half of the season claimed another victim in starting defensive end Solomon Sands, who suffered a concussion in Friday’s game.

Sands will miss this Friday’s regular-season finale along with over a handful of his teammates. The only injured player Young is hopeful will be able to return is offensive lineman Rashad Norman.

The team’s abundance of inactive players was further worsened due to a third-quarter scuffle that resulted in the ejections of a starting linebacker, a starting offensive lineman, and a reserve defensive lineman. According to Georgia High School Association rules, when a player is ejected from a contest, that player must miss his team’s next game as well.

The lone highlight of the second half for the ’Hounds was a 47-yard touchdown run by Zach Blount with 3:09 left in the contest.

“I think he’s going to be a real good player for us in the future,” Young said of the sophomore. “He ran through the right hole, and the biggest thing I like was seeing that burst when he hit the open field.”

Statistically, Lanford finished with seven completions in 14 pass attempts for 114 yards with the one touchdown to Thomas and one interception.

Jake Robertson, the team’s starter at the beginning of the season who’s been sidelined with an ankle injury, came in late in the game and went 1-for-1 for 4 yards.

Lanford finished with 59 yards on 10 carries. Blount added 48 yards, and David Blanton had 29 of the team’s total of 150 rushing yards.

Thomas had the one reception for 54 yards, and Blanton had five catches for 45 yards.

Ian Tuft had 12 solo tackles. Pope and Stone each had 10 total tackles, and Pope recovered a fumble. Chase Lundy also recovered a fumble, and Devon Pace had an interception.

Kevin Jackson punted four times for an average of 38 yards per kick with a long of 52.