GRAY DEYOSports Writer

The Tullahoma Wildcats football team traveled to Sparta and suffered their first loss of the 2025 season, falling to the opposing Warriors 24-13.

It was not the outcome the Wildcats wanted when traveling up to White County, but it’s the outcome they got. A couple of major areas where Tullahoma lost this game were in taking care of the ball and White County’s ability to limit the Wildcats’ star running back, Marvancy Johnson Jr.

Tullahoma opened up the second half on their opening drive with an interception. This is the first time out of the four games that the Wildcats have played where they did not come away with a score on their first drive of the second half. The Warriors took advantage of this and continued to play the time game against Tullahoma, with a 10-7 lead at that moment.

The Wildcats, with just under three minutes in the third, got the ball back from White County, and that possession ended up being their only fifth of the game. This approach from the Warriors, prolonging possessions, proved to be effective, and again, the turnovers for the Wildcats just did them in. On that possession Warriors player Lex Winfrey hit the Tullahoma QB and secured a strip sack. The ball was recovered by the Warriors inside Tullahoma territory. Running back for White County, Cole Simms eventually capitalized on this Wildcat mistake and ran in his second touchdown of the game.

In the middle of the fourth quarter, as Tullahoma tried to make one final push at a comeback, the Wildcats threw another interception off a tipped pass. The Warriors, like they did with the strip sack, turned this Tullahoma turnover into points. This came from a 20+ yard run from their junior White County quarterback, Tucker Pinion.

Despite the Warriors containing Johnson Jr. pretty well in this game, he still had his moments and was responsible for both of Tullahoma’s touchdowns. He scored in the second quarter off a nine-yard run and scored in the fourth quarter on a run where he broke multiple tackles.

The Wildcats will look to bounce back from their lone loss of 2025, but they will not get the benefit of an easy upcoming opponent to do it against. This coming Friday, they will take on the team that put their season to an end a season ago, the Nolensville Knights. The Knights are coming off a 41-7 blowout loss against one of the best teams in TN, the Blackman Blaze.