Warriors and Bulldogs to collide in conference tilt

Published 8:00 am Wednesday, September 6, 2023

STAR CORRESPONDENT

Two teams in need of a victory to right the ship and potentially save their season will collide at J.C. Campbell Stadium on Friday night when Happy Valley visits Hampton in a conference matchup.

The Warriors come off a week three bye but have issues with injuries.

“We have had a lot of injuries, but we see it as next man up,” Warriors head coach Jason Jarrett said. “But we are running out of next man up. Hampton has played tough against two quality teams. Pisgah is loaded and they played them tough. We cleaned up the penalty issues we had in game one and except for a blocked punt we could have gone into halftime against Unicoi 0-0.”

Happy Valley (0-2 overall) has struggled offensively, falling to Cloudland 14-12 and the Blue Devils 37-6 while Hampton (1-2 overall) has been held to 14 points in each of their two defeats.

The ‘Dogs run game was strong in the loss at Pisgah, with Geno Carrico scoring a late touchdown and Peyton Townsend rushing for 61 yards. The passing game saw Dylan Trivett complete 11-of-13 passes for 163 yards with Elijah McKinney and J.J. McElyea with 62 and 61 receiving yards respectively.

For the Warriors in the week two loss to Unicoi County, Jamie Esterline had 46 yards, including a 23-yard touchdown gallop and senior Joseph Sowards had 44 ground yards.

“After Unicoi blocked the punt, it was ‘Katy bar the door,” Jarrett said. “When it rains it pours and we could not stop them from then on. We had some bright spots but we couldn’t get rolling. I think we are headed in the right direction and I do see a light at the end of the tunnel, but we need to find a way to get back to playing like Happy Valley has historically played. I mean in every sport we play, not just football. A win against top competition like Hampton would be a step in the right direction.”

Game time is 7:30 pm.