By Devin Smith

Counties clashed Friday evening as the Dale County Warriors ran through the Pike County Bulldogs by a score of 56-26.

The Warriors drew blood first shortly after recovering a fumble deep in Bulldogs territory and later in the quarter would score again on a 79-yard burst up the right sideline to take a 13-0 lead.

The resilient Bulldogs would not stay down long, answering with a 61-yard touchdown through the air brought in by Ryshaun Hall.

On its next drive Pike County would strike again and take a short-lived 14-13 advantage into the half.

The opening kickoff would be returned 68-yards off a hop by Jamarius Henderson for the scoop-and-score, who finished with 379 total yards and 5 touchdowns.

Pike County head coach Fred Holland knew that his team had its work cut out for them with Henderson coming into this week’s game.

“They’ve got a real good back,” said Holland. “He’s one of the top in the Wiregrass, we gave up a lot of big plays with him. He’s a very tough runner that is really tough to stop. We knew that coming in, we just have to do better at maintaining some of the stuff we’re doing in the second half.”

Despite the Bulldogs troubles slowing Henderson most other aspects of the game went well, and they showed some significant improvements in other areas.

“It wasn’t all bad,” said Holland. “There were some things that we did a lot better, we just have to work on sustaining that in the second half of the game.”

The Bulldogs were outscored 43-12 in the second half, much of that due to untimely penalties and turnovers.

Despite the scoreboard Holland is still staying positive about his team’s effort and improvements.

It wasn’t all bad,” said Holland. “We did some really good things. We just have to keep working, all we can do is come back here and get after it again. The loss doesn’t take away from the hard work that these guys are putting in.”

Warriors head coach Jeff Torrence wasn’t pleased with his team’s performance but happy to get a victory.

“I don’t think we performed to our capabilities,” said Torrence. “We had a lot of miscues and unforced errors that we don’t have to make. We just had a great performance from our running back and offensive line and were just able to power the ball up in there tonight.”

Now sitting at 0-2 in regional play the Bulldogs will try to get on the right track next week when they travel to Abbeville.