North Carolina Central defeated Jackson State in overtime, 41–34, to send out Sanders on a slightly sour note, but it doesn’t tarnish his JSU legacy.
ATLANTA — One game stood between Jackson State and a supreme storybook ending. The writing—filled with four-months worth of lessons in the peaks and valleys of adversity in a dozen wins—had been plastered on the wall for the Tigers to reach perfection.
However, not all movies culminate with a picture-perfect, fairytale ending. Chasing “dominance” and perfection is not easy. Tom Brady and the 2007 Patriots couldn’t quite finish the job. A Jackson State-dominant crowd of fans inside Mercedes-Benz Stadium for Saturday’s Celebration Bowl, rocking their pom poms to the music of The Sonic Boom of the South, hoped Deion Sanders’s final Tigers team could have a different outcome.