South Pointe football embraces smack talk

As if Nick McCloud needed any more motivation, he got some last weekend.

After thumping Chapman in the second round of the playoffs, Seneca players engaged in some spirited exchanges with South Pointe players, McCloud included, on Twitter.

South Pointe travels to Seneca Friday for the two teams’ 3A state playoffs third round matchup. With star sophomore Derion Kendrick (high ankle sprain) out injured and playing on the road against the undefeated Bobcats (12-0), the Stallions (11-1) are in the unusual position of being the underdogs.

But Thursday’s annual Thanksgiving practice at the school made clear the South Pointe program embraces that role. Seneca’s online smack talk has only heightened the Stallions’ sense of “us against the world.”

“We know they’re ready, but that’s actually good for our guys,” said South Pointe coach Strait Herron. “They thrive on that kind of stuff.”

He smiled.

“We’ll be ready too.”

Long distance, virtual smack talk is a phenomenon that wouldn’t have occurred even five or six years ago, but times have changed and schools 145 miles apart are closer than ever. McCloud, who has 52 tackles and five interceptions this fall, relished the challenge from the Bobcats’ players.

“I love playing on the road first of all,” he said before Thursday’s practice at the school. “And then the fact that they’ve been jawing a lot is gonna help us a lot because I think we respond better whenever teams like to jaw a lot. Like A.C. Flora did all that and we went down there and smashed them.”

McCloud’s mid-season highlights:

McCloud referenced South Pointe’s 40-21 win on the road at Flora in last year’s Upper State championship game. Two rounds prior, the Stallions ended Seneca’s season with a 19-15 win, the source of the Bobcats’ eagerness to meet South Pointe again. Seneca turned the ball over six times in last year’s loss, leaving the visitors with a bitter two and a half hour ride home. The loss led to plenty of stewing, especially as the Stallions marched to the state championship several weeks later.

Seneca coach Brett Turner said the experience made his team get better.

“We just realized we had an opportunity and we didn’t seize that opportunity,” he said Tuesday. “It gave our kids some motivation to hopefully get back into position to make the playoffs and maybe go further than what we did last year. And it helped us to get motivated to work harder in the weight room; we needed to get stronger.”

Turner took over for Gene Cathcart, who surprisingly stepped down after just one season last spring. Turner, the team’s defensive coordinator and father of standout senior QB Elijah Turner, stepped into the lead role without missing a beat. Having 17 returning starters, including a big offensive line, a talented pair of running backs in Braxton Gambrell and Jacory Benson, and a Shrine Bowl defensive lineman in Nike Diggs made that easier to do.

After side-eying the Stallions, Seneca turns it full attention to them now. South Pointe is the measuring stick in 3A football, especially for a talented Bobcats team eager to legitimize its unbeaten run.

“We really try to focus on the opponent that we’re playing that week,” said Turner. “We felt like if we do the little things right, and we’re disciplined, and just focus on that one team that one week, but more than that, really we’ve just tried to focus on us, and what we do, and be consistent.

Poking the Stallions on Twitter might not have been the best idea, though. McCloud epitomizes his team’s mindset, taking even the slightest slight and turning it into motivation for Friday nights.

“They’ve been waiting for this game, but we’ve been waiting for this game too,” said McCloud. “We want to go to another state championship so I think that’s what’s motivating us right now.”

The 6-foot-3 senior is swimming in college football offers - Northwestern, N.C. State, West Virginia and East Carolina are among the 20 or so schools he could choose from - but isn’t focused on that right now. Instead, McCloud obsesses about the Shrine Bowl passing him over, or the fact the South Carolina Gamecocks are among the few schools that haven’t offered him a scholarship, or that the Seneca Bobcats are coming at him online.

McCloud isn’t an innocent victim on Twitter. He’s definitely a nexus of smack talk, whether offering it up after a Stallions’ win or receiving it because of his statewide profile. The whole team shares McCloud’s shoulder chip, one of the intangibles that’s made practicing on Thanksgiving an annual thing at South Pointe.

“I think that’s just how we are,” said McCloud. “We’ve always been like that since we were eight, nine years old. It’s just in us.”

This story was originally published November 26, 2015 at 11:05 AM with the headline "South Pointe football embraces smack talk."