It will go down as an exhibition — call it a four-quarter jamboree game if you will — but Brookhaven Academy football coach Ron Rushing calls his team’s game on Saturday a teaching tool.

Rushing and his squad made a five-hour trip to Montgomery, Alabama to take on the Thomas Heyward Academy Rebels. Heyward is a private school out of Ridgeland, South Carolina, and met the Cougars in the SECIS Kickoff Classic at the Cramton Bowl.

After jumping up 7-0, the Cougars would turn the ball over seven times in a 49-28 loss. For Rushing the trip was a chance to get film on his younger players and put them in tough situations to see how they’ll respond.

“When you turn the ball over seven times, you can’t win at anything,” Rushing said. “We saw some good stuff along with the bad. Our offensive line did a solid job run blocking and Cade Brown and Cole Griffin made some plays at the wide receiver position.”

The Cougars and their supporters left Brookhaven around 7:30 a.m. on Saturday morning and, after a stop for a pregame meal, they arrived in Montgomery at 1:30 p.m. The Cramton Bowl is a 22,000-seat stadium that is home to the Camellia Bowl game every December.

The SECIS Kickoff pits private and independent schools from all over the south against each other every year. The Cougars game started at 4:30 p.m. and they arrived back in Brookhaven around 1:30 a.m. on Sunday.

“We played everybody we took, and we saw some things this week that we’ll have to address and correct,” Rushing said. “We’re not going to shake too much up, we just didn’t play very well, but there are definitely some things we’ll tweak as we get ready for Cathedral on Friday.”

In other area jamboree action from Friday, Lawrence County and Wesson saw their contest get rained out. Loyd Star topped Enterprise 21-0 and knocked off Bogue Chitto 21-6. West Lincoln beat Enterprise 8-0.

Story by Cliff Furr.