YESTERDAY: The All-Metro offense
TOMORROW: Coach of the Year and the Offensive and Defensive Players of the Year
JOURNAL STAFF
The voting for the Shreveport-Bossier Journal’s All-Metro Offensive team, featured in Monday’s edition, was predictably varied as 22 different players received votes for 12 spots.
Not so for the Journal’s All-Metro Defensive team.
Choosing four players at each level – defensive line, linebacker and defensive back – the voting was fairly clear-cut.
The four players chosen at both defensive line and linebacker were on every ballot. And at each level, there was a player who received the maximum of possible first-place votes – Northwood teammates TaDerius Collins (defensive line) and Mar’Jayvious Moss (defensive back) and Byrd linebacker Brooks Brossette.
Collins had an amazing 13 quarterback sacks and 25 tackles behind the line for the Falcons. Moss patrolled the middle of the field from his safety position and was easily the leading tackler for Northwood with 85.
Brossette was the unquestioned leader of the Byrd defense and had 115 total tackles, including 21 against John Curtis in the quarterfinal playoff game.
On the defensive line, Byrd’s Isaiah Ford was third on the team in tackles for the Yellow Jackets with 64 and had 6.5 sacks and 12 tackles behind the line. Evangel’s Gabriel Reliford (23) and Parkway’s Ray Mayweather (16) also made a living making tackles behind the line.
Calvary’s Cade Bedgood led a defense that had three straight shutouts at one point in the season and recorded 110 tackles with five tackles for loss. Linebackers Connor Blank of Haughton and Barrett Newman of Parkway each had more than 100 tackles for the season.
In the backfield, Benton’s Sawyer Simmons had two interceptions and 5 ½ tackles for loss while Calvary’s Landon Sylvie had 68 tackles and led the Cavaliers with three interceptions. Playing mostly man-to-man all season, Parkway sophomore Camaro Mayo had 10 passes broken up and allowed only one touchdown all season.
Parkway led with three defensive selections with Byrd, Northwood and Calvary having two each.
DEFENSE
Defensive line – TaDerius Collins, Northwood (Sr.)*
Defensive line – Isaiah Ford, Byrd (Sr.)
Defensive line – Ray Mayweather, Parkway (Sr.)
Defensive line – Gabriel Reliford, Evangel (Jr.)
Linebacker – Cade Bedgood, Calvary (Sr.)
Linebacker – Connor Blank, Haughton (Sr.)
Linebacker – Brooks Brossette, Byrd (Sr.)*
Linebacker – Barrett Newman, Parkway (Sr.)
Defensive back – Mar’Jayvious Moss, Northwood (Sr.)*
Defensive back – Carmaro Mayo, Parkway (Soph.)
Defensive back – Sawyer Simmons, Benton (Sr.)
Defensive back – Landon Sylvie, Calvary (Jr.)
* Received unanimous first-place votes at his position
Listed below are the Journal’s “Best of the Rest,” which recognizes those who either had a high recommendation or received point totals in the voting that put them in consideration for the first team.
BEST OF THE REST
Defensive line – Jaylon Buckner, Huntington (Sr.)
Linebacker – Gray Deason, Loyola (Sr.)
Defensive back – Christian Jones, Byrd (Sr.), Zach Halbert, Benton (Sr.)