AND THE SPARTANS’ RELENTLESS DEFENSE
WERE CERTAINLY EQUAL TO THE TASK.
SOUTH COACH BRANDON SMITH: ‘WE WERE IN A RHYTHM ALL NIGHT …’
South Warren High School’s football team finally got a chance to compete in the KHSAA Class 6A football playoffs on Friday night, one week after Christian County High School took a pass.
Before the Colonels closed the regular season by taking a 54-7 drubbing at the hands of mighty Paducah Tilghman at Paducah’s McRight Stadium.
Maybe Christian County officials were clairvoyant, because the two KHSAA Class 6A schools will merge, at long last, for the 2026-27 academic year.
And Hopkinsville High School’s talented squad, which advanced to the second-round of the Class 6A playoffs by piledriving Daviess County, 50-20, would have to play somewhere besides the historical 5,000-seat Stadium of Champions in Hoptown.
Like, say, South Warren’s lair on Nashville Road.
Let’s say The Last Train For Clarksville has definitely left the station …
South Warren 53, Hopkinsville 21.
BREAKS THE POCKET FOR CRITICAL YARDAGE
IN THE SPARTANS’ DOMINANT THIRD QUARTER.
INTO THE END ZONE JUST BEFORE HALFTIME.
WAS USED IN SEVERAL ROLES IN
THE SPARTANS’ DECISIVE VICTORY.
IS A 6-FOOT-3, 320-POUND FORCE
WITH THE SPARTANS’ DEFENSE.
ON THE LINE NEXT WEEK AGAINST
AN UPSTART HENDERSON COUNTY SQUAD.
The Spartans’ offense was as efficient as they come, and the South Warren defense brought the heat from more vantage points than you could count.
“We were in a rhythm the whole night,” South Warren coach Brandon Smith said.
Compared to, say, the unbeaten Spartans’ victory over Hopkinsville in mid-September at the aforementioned Stadium of Champions.
Weather delays, lots of points, and all the logistics therein contributed to a long night at the office, for Smith’s Spartans and the homestanding Tigers, too. South Warren would win that game, 33-21, before outscoring its next three opponents by a whopping 139-3.
That is NOT a misprint.
Ask Pulaski County, Meade County and Central Hardin, who collectively got pushed out of the way, as South Warren rounded into late-season form.
The Spartans take a 12-0 overall record into the KHSAA Class 6A regional championship round, and they’ll play host to an upstart Henderson County squad next Friday.
Henderson County upset McCracken County, 41-34. on Friday night in Paducah. The Colonels are 6-6 overall, but they’ve recovered from a three-game losing streak to make some noise in the KHSAA’s largest classification.
While South Warren’s tag-team quarterbacks, 6-foot-4 junior Camden Page and 6-foot-3 sophomore Chase Bell, will be waiting.
Buckle up, guys.
AND CALEB WILSON (No. 77) MAKE THE CALL AT THE LINE.
HAS COMPILED SEVEN TACKLES FOR LOSSES.
AND THE SPARTANS’ OFFENSE AWAIT
THE CALL FROM THE SIDELINE …
COLE’s TWIN BROTHER, HAS HAD
AN IMPACT ON THE EDGE …
HAS SETTLED INTO HIS ROLE, TOO.
“Everything was smooth, and much different, than the last time,” South coach Brandon Smith said of his team’s prolific offense. “I feel like we couldn’t get anything going the last time we played them … We made some adjustments and were a little better prepared this time.
“Defensively, they’re a good team, and I stand by that.”
Page, Bell and the South Warren offense rolled off the assembly line with remarkable precision against Hopkinsville, which finishes its season at 7-5 overall.
South Warren’s offense racked up 529 yards in total offense, compared to the Tigers’ 246, and the Spartans scored touchdowns on seven of their first eight possessions on the night.
The ninth one, when Smith and the Spartans declined to play for a cosmetic touchdown, ended in the red zone, signaling the end of Hopkinsville High School football — at least as the fine folks of Hoptown know it — while serving notice to the rest of the Commonwealth.
They’re comin’ … and they mean business.
“We got in a groove out there,” South Warren tailback Kayden York said.
“Every time we take the field, as an offense, we feel like we have to score,” added South Warren senior Griffin Reynolds, the Swiss army knife who fills so many roles for Brandon Smith’s squad.
SCORES ON A 3-YARD TOUCHDOWN RUN.
TO FRESHMAN RUNNING BACK WALKER SUMMERS.
AMASSED 328 YARDS ON THE GROUND.
MAKES A RECEPTION IN THE FLAT.
IS THE TEAM’s ‘SWISS ARMY KNIFE’
York plowed into the end zone from 4 yards out, with just 18 seconds left in the first half, and the TIgers seemed content to return to their locker room facing a double-digit deficit, but something they’d already carved into, with the outcome seemingly very much in doubt.
Instead of kicking the extra point, however, Smith reached into his trick-play arsenal, wtih Reynolds taking a reverse handoff from Page before passing the ball to a wide-open Tucker Sears in the Tigers’ end zone, extending the Spartans’ lead to 29-16.
Simply put, the second half was more of the same.
South Warren had the ball to open the game’s final 24 minutes and wasted no time getting past the goal line.
After South was hit with a couple false starts, junior QB Camden Page found teammate Jake Carter on a slip screen to the left side of the field. Carter used a couple decisive cuts to punch out an impressive 22-yard reception, and then Page needed just three more plays to get the Spartans back in the end zone.
Page scored on a 3-yard touchdown run, with 6:46 left in the third quarter, extending the South Warren lead to 35-16. (This time, the two-point conversion try failed.)
Still, the Spartans seemed to smell blood in the water.
And it certainly wasn’t their own.
SCORES ON A 41-YARD TD RECEPTION.
IN FOOTBALL AND BASEBALL ALIKE.
RUSHED FOR A TEAM-HIGH 685 YARDS
AND SEVENTEEN TOUCHDOWNS.
AND KAYDEN YORK PLAN TO GO OUT WITH A BANG.
Tucker Sears, the Spartans’ junior wideout who doubles as a catcher for South coach Chris Gage’s tradition-rich baseball team, got behind the Hopkinsville secondary for his team’s next score.
Page unloaded a deep ball to Sears in the middle of the field, and he completed the 41-yard scoring reception from about 10 yards out. Alen Alec’s PAT made it 43-16, which meant South Warren needed just one more touchdown, and a two-point conversion to force a KHSAA-mandated running clock for the game’s duration.
No problem.
Sophomore running back Jamir Boards, who rushed for a team-high 80 yards and two touchdowns, hit the left sideline before scoring on a 35-yard TD run. Three penalty flags soared into the air, before South Warren coach Brandon Smith could empty his bench and complete the task at hand.
Sophomore QB Chase Bell scored on a two-point conversion, putting the Spartans at the magic 35-point mark, before Hoptown’s Jasiah McCarley unloaded a 17-yard touchdown pass to Aiden Jesse, the Tigers’ talented 6-foot-4 wide receiver.
It was Jesse’s second TD of the night, as he broke a tackle on his way to an 81-yard scoring reception in the first quarter.
South’s Camden Page completed 14 of 16 passes for 224 yards and a third-quarter score, while Bell finished with 104 yards through the air, completing seven of nine passes while adding a touchdown on the ground.
It was a night for Brandon Smith and the Spartans to remember.
“The quarterback play was outstanding,” Smith said. “When they’re locked in, these guys (Page and Bell) can really play. We wanted to work on the clock, put points on the board … We converted some big third downs … Our quarterbacks are playing at a high level.
“They (Hopkinsville) are a good team.”
Now it’s time for the Spartans to play for another regional championship, and their first in the KHSAA’s largest classification. Should South Warren knock off Henderson County, the Spartans’ state semifinal opponent will be determined by the KHSAA’s RPI formula.
Buckle up.
ON THE PRACTICE FIELD MONDAY …
THE FIELD ONE LAST TIME, BEFORE NEXT SUMMER’s
MERGER WITH CHRISTIAN COUNTY HIGH SCHOOL.
OBVIOUSLY HAD NO INTEREST IN SCORING
A COSMETIC TD IN THE FINAL MINUTE.
FROM 1993-99, WAS ON HAND ON TO SEE
GRANDSONS COLE AND CLAY PLAY FOR THE SPARTANS …
WANTS EVERYONE TO KNOW SHE’s FEELING BETTER.