By CURTIS ROCKWELL/Sports Director

OCEAN SPRINGS — For the third straight season, Ocean Springs and Gulfport will battle for the region championship on the football field.
And at Greyhound Stadium Friday night, the Admirals will try and capture their first league crown in five years.
One of three showdowns for a top spot atop a region race in the “Southern Six” Friday night takes place in Ocean Springs as the home-standing Greyhounds host Gulfport in Region 4-7A play. Ocean Springs, the three time region champ, comes in on a 22-game region winning streak in this Big Battle that will decide the top seed in the league for the upcoming Class 7A South State playoffs.

Both teams sit at 3-0, and this marks the third straight meeting between the two teams when both come in unbeaten in region play. Ocean Springs has not only won the previous two contests but is also on a four game winning streak over the Admirals. Gulfport is 18-4 over its last 22 region games with three of those losses coming to OSHS.
Gulfport leads the all-time series 21-11, but the teams have evenly split the past 10 games since 2014.
Last week, Ocean Springs turned a slight 14-7 first half lead into a 34-14 win with a pretty dominant second half performance against home-standing Biloxi. Greyhound quarterback Sharroid Whitehead accounted for three touchdowns to help the Greyhounds get the win.

“It was a good win but we’ve got plenty to clean up,” second year OSHS mentor Jake Bramlett, whose team moved to to the .500 level for the first time all season at 4-4, said. “I was very proud of our effort, and it was a great game by our defense.”
Those aforementioned Admirals stayed neck and neck with OSHS in the Region 4-7A standings with a 42-7 thumping of visiting St. Martin at historic Milner Stadium last week.

Gulfport fell behind early 7-0, but simply responded with 42 unanswered points to move to 6-2 overall. Quarterback Dane Sullivan threw for just over 260 yards and three touchdowns in the winning effort, while his backfield teammates Cooper Crosby and Dakorean Payton combined for over 300 yards of total offense and three scores as well.