For a half, Vicksburg High’s offense was a frustrated bunch.

Four trips inside the red zone had netted just seven points. The Gators missed a field goal and turned it over on downs twice as Greenville-Weston dropped seven or eight defenders back in coverage, clogging up the passing lanes for Gators quarterback Cameron Cooksey.

The result was only one completion out of eight attempts for two yards. Instead of being up at the half, Vicksburg trailed 14-7.

The Gators’ plan changed in the second half, and so did their season. Vicksburg came back to beat Greenville 35-31 as Cooksey connected on three second half touchdown passes — the last a 26-yarder to Lamar Anthony with 1:05 left in the game.

Although the touchdowns came through the air, they were set up by a productive running game. Running back Darius Youngblood had a career-best 140 yards rushing, 89 coming in the second half. Youngblood’s aggressive running thwarted the Hornets’ attempts to drop men into coverage. Cooksey was able to take advantage with play-action passes.

He completed just five passes in the second half, but three were touchdowns and the other two went for gains of 29 and 45 yards. Cooksey finished 16-of-39 for 231 yards.

“We were just off with our routes there in the first half, but we got on the same page in the second half,” Cooksey said. “Having the best running game all year, helped set up some things for us.”

Anthony said the Gators (3-4, 1-2 Region 2-6A) made the right adjustments.

“They came out and shut some things down, so we just had to run the ball more,” Anthony said. “Greenville has some physical corners, but we ran our routes better and got open.”

For Greenville-Weston coach Todd Lott, this was the second straight week his defense could not finish off a game with a win. The previous Friday, Warren Central scored a touchdown with 1:16 left to win 35-34 at Viking Stadium.

“We’re real young in the secondary,” Lott said. “I thought we did a good job against (A.J.) Stamps, but he’s a great player and got open in the second half. This makes two weeks in a row and it’s the story of our season. It’s tough when your players play their hearts out.”

Stamps is Vicksburg’s senior wide receiver who set a state record for receptions (19), yards (285) and receiving touchdowns (five) in a 42-40 loss to Northwest Rankin on Sept. 30.

In the first half against Greenville (1-6, 0-3), Stamps had just two catches for 7 yards. He caught two more for 74 yards in the second half to tie the single season record of 53 receptions held by Bunkie Perkins.

Perkins, a former VHS star, set the mark in 1997.

Cooksey’s three TD passes gave him 27 for the season and 51 for his career, which surpassed the career record set by Ernest Moore at North Vicksburg and Vicksburg High from 1971-73.

Cooksey had already passed Moore’s career yardage record, and is on the brink of several more milestones. He needs two more touchdown passes for the single-season record — currently 28, held by Moore, Temple’s William Wooley and Porters Chapel Academy’s Hayden Hales. Cooksey also needs 271 yards to break the single-season yardage record set by Vicksburg’s Tommy Curtis in 1997.

The single-season records are the only Warren County passing records that Cooksey doesn’t yet own.

Personal marks aside, Gators coach Alonzo Stevens likes the direction of his team. The win over Greenville not only showed his team has heart, it also kept its playoff hopes alive. Six teams in Region 2-6A are separated by a game in the standings.

“We keep plugging away,” Stevens said. “We were out of sync there in the first half. We dropped some balls. They were giving us the run and I thought Darius Youngblood did a tremendous job running between the tackles. That allowed us to get more 1-on-1 coverage and we hit the big plays.”