The Pike County Pirate Football team visited the Ed Defore Sports Complex Friday night to take on the Rutland High School Hurricanes.
“This was a game with high stakes and equally high emotions. The Pirates fell behind 6-0 lead when the Hurricanes scored on their first series on a screen pass that went 77 yards to the house,” said Pirates coach Craig Chatman. “After that opening score however, it was all Pirates.”
After going three and out on the next offensive series, the Pirates defense was able to hold, and a bad punt snap gave the Pirates the ball at the 16-yard line. On the next play, quarterback Bryce Sammons sprinted through the Rutland defense for the 16-yard score. Jack Hammond’s PAT was good and the Pirates led 7-6. Sammons had another 16-yard scoring run on the next drive, and Semaj Smith had a 6-yard run on the following drive for a 21-6 halftime advantage for the Pirates.
Jack Hammond started the second half with a beautiful surprise on-side kick and the Pirates went 48 yards in two plays for a 28-6 advantage on the 1-yard Sammons run. Rutland was able to score a TD on its next possession, but another 1-yard Sammons TD run with just over 5 minutes to play made the score 35-12 Pirates.
The Pirates defense forced three turnovers and the Pirates offense rushed for 178 yards on 37 carries and 5 touchdowns to secure what many believe will be the first play-off appearance for the Pirates since 2017.
Next week the Pirates are off for the end of the regular season. They will find out who their playoff opponent will be Saturday and the opening round of the AA state playoffs begin Nov. 15-16.
“Our football program has 3 goals and #1 is to be playing our best football by Week 1, #2 to be playing our best football by Week 5 and #3 is to be playing our best football by the first round of the playoffs,” said head coach Stephen Holmes. “Our team played in 10 great regular season games that saw our team grow each week. We faced four top 10 opponents during the regular season and each week our team showed resiliency and toughness.”
Hurricane Helene hit mid-season and caused a lot of games to get postponed, so the GHSA extended the regular season by one week.
“GHSA will use a Power Ranking System this season to determine the Top 32 teams in the playoffs,” said Holmes. “The date is Friday, Nov. 15 but the opponent is yet to be determined.”