YOUNGSVILLE – When the Southside defense forced a 3-and-out to begin the third quarter, no one could have predicted what happened on the next drive.

Well, maybe Southside coach Jess Curtis could have. After all, the Sharks are known for controlling the clock, running the football and imposing physicality on opposing defenses.

Up 10-7 at the time, Southside embarked on a 23-play, 80-yard drive that burned 11:43 off the clock. Quarterback Parker Dies capped off the drive with a touchdown to put the Sharks up 17-7.

STM scored a touchdown with 4:08 to play, but Southside again relied on running backs Justin Williams and Coby Broussard to run out the clock with a nine-play drive to seal the 17-14 win.

“That’s Southside football,” Curtis said. “It's really who we are. We like to control the tempo of the game. We like to be physical. We like to move the chains and we kind of got away from it early in the season. We forgot about 'dirty yards.' You gotta be good at dirty yards and tonight we were good at that.”

Williams, who led the Southside in rushing with 121 yards on 29 carries, said the physical 12-minute drive in the second half is exactly what the Sharks work on every day.

“We work on my stamina and we prepare for this kind of Friday night,” Williams said. “We got a 'Southside drive' tonight.

“When the O-line is blocking like that, it’s physical football and we went out there and executed and scored the ball. It's like that’s what we're supposed to do.”

Curtis called Williams the “bell cow” of the Southside offense and said the program has owed a lot to him for what he’s done over the past three seasons.

“We have a lot of really talented players, but when Justin sets the table, we are hard to beat,” Curtis said. “I can’t believe a player like Justin Williams doesn’t have a college offer. It is almost criminal. He’s led the whole damn city in rushing and defenses focus on him every week.

“They had the whole school of STM in the box trying to stop him and he still ran right through them. He’s done it to the best in this state and he did it again tonight.”

The significance of beating STM isn’t lost on Curtis. He said he knows the Cougars have one fo the best programs in the state. Curtis said the Sharks were at a point in the season where they needed to decide what the standard of Southside football is. He said Friday’s win goes a long way to defining that.

“We had to really dig in and play our football and play up to the standards here at Southside,” Curtis said. “I'm just really proud of them, because that's what we did tonight. We played Southside football tonight and we got another one next week (against Acadiana).

"I hope we're mature enough to celebrate this win, but get it behind us quickly and go win another big game next week.”