It was a good overall week for local sports, as all four Pike County prep teams won their football games Friday night. If you missed it, here are the highlights:

Pike County 29, Andalusia 18

What can you say about the Bulldogs (1-0) that hasn't already been said? Winners of two state championships in a row and ranked No. 1 in the state, the Bulldogs are rolling. We'll know more as the season progresses, but right now it looks like coach Wayne Grant and his kids are on their way to defending their title. They've gotten an awful lot of press from a lot of different places, but as long as they don't let that go to their heads, they'll be fine.

Charles Henderson 42, Wilcox Central 6

Talk about a beating. Charles Henderson (1-0) dominated from the opening snap when Svante Davenport took a Wilcox Central (0-1) fumble 20 yards in the opposite direction for a score. Charles Henderson never looked back, and cruised to a relatively easy win. The Trojan defense has to be a tired bunch, as they were on the field the majority of the game. But here's how good that defense looked: Wilcox didn't score until nearly every Charles Henderson player had been subbed into the game at one position or another.

Goshen 36, Bullock County 20

Goshen (1-0) senior returned the Hornets' opening kickoff for a touchdown to set the stage for the Eagles' victory. Goshen has the misfortune in playing in an extremely tough region, where most of the teams posted a better than .500 record in 2006. But the Eagles, led by seniors Marty Anderson and Marquez Maddox, looked sharp in sloppy conditions as they powered past an overmatched Bullock County squad.

Pike Lib 39, Edgewood Academy 22

Pike Liberal Arts (1-1) looked like a different team this week. After a couple of position changes in the defensive secondary, the Patriots came out and dominated Edgewood's spread offense. The score isn't indicative of how dominating the Patriots actually were. Edgewood's vaunted spread offense gave them the lead in the first quarter, but coach Bobby Carr's group wouldn't score against the Patriot's first-team defense again for the remainder of the game. Coach Steven Kilcrease deserves credit for his team's remarkable performance.

And now to the not-so-fun subject:

Arkansas 46, Troy 26

Let's not mince words: a loss is a loss. But the Trojans proved that in the first half, they can play with anyone. Troy trailed by six at the half, 23-17. Unfortunately, some mistakes cost Troy in the second half, and Arkansas prevailed. But if you look at the last time Troy played Arkansas (a 23-0 loss in 2002), you can certainly see that this program has improved.

Troy players, boosters, fans and alumni need to remember that it's only one loss. There are still endless possibilities out there: upsets, conference championships and another possible bowl bid.

Upset? What upset?

If you're the two-time I-AA defending national champion Appalachian State, you don't really consider knocking off Michigan an upset. But everyone else does. Folks who really follow football from week to week shouldn't have been that surprised. Michigan's defense was suspect all last year, and that's apparently continued into 2007. The Mountaineers are a good bet to threepeat as champions in what's now called the &uot;Football Championship Subdivision.&uot;

Errors, omissions and addendums

An error in Saturday's edition: A Pike Liberal Arts photo on page 2B bore the photo credit of Clif Lusk.

The photo was in fact taken by Danny Sanders.