WARREN EAST KEEPS ROLLING/Parsley, Price and the Raiders race past Warren Central 56-20, stay unbeaten

EAST TAKES 7-0 RECORD INTO OPEN DATE; DRAGONS LOOK TO REGROUP

The Warren East High School football team has designs on doing something big.

Real big.

Sophomore quarterback Dane Parsley guided the unbeaten Raiders to a 56-20 victory over crosstown rival Warren Central High School on Thursday night at Jim Ross Field, putting an exclamation point on an up-and-down second half with a sensational 53-yard touchdown run that accounted for the final margin in the final moments of the third quarter.

Junior wideout Tray Price gave Warren East a quick-strike threat in the passing game, and Parsley used the protection of the Raiders’ experienced offensive line to find secondary receivers across the field in the rout of the Dragons.

Warren Central (3-3, 2-1 in KHSAA Class 4A, 2nd District play) actually scored first and had some success moving the football, but the Dragons’ defense was simply no match for Parsley and Company on a chilly, windy night that suggested mid-November rather than the final days of September.

Veteran Warren East coach Jeff Griffith is careful not to put the cart in front of the horse, but he acknowledges the Raiders are a talented team that could make a deep run in the Class 4A playoffs.

Maybe, just maybe, the KHSAA Championship Weekend at Lexington’s Kroger Field come December.

First things first.

Griffith has given his team more than one week off, coinciding with Fall Break for Warren County public schools, and the Raiders will go their separate ways before resuming district play with a road trip to scrap with traditional rival Allen County-Scottsville (1-5, 0-2) on October 14 in Scottsville.

“I was happy with our effort tonight,” Griffith said, “but we got a little sloppy in the second half. Turnovers, penalties, those kinds of things … Overall, though, we did a lot of good things out there tonight.”

Warren Central coach Mark Nelson and his squad, meanwhile, will try to regroup for next week’s road trip to play non-district opponent Green County (3-2) in Greensburg. A scheduling quirk left the Dragons with just three home games this season.

The Raiders say they’re ready for a break.

“We’re 7-0, going into the bye week,” East quarterback Dane Parsley said when it was over. “It’s really good, to rest our bodies, and come back for Allen County … We’ve got a lot of athletes. But the linemen, really, make everything possible.

“They give me time to see the entire field.”

The entire field is stocked with talented skill position players, but the Dragons aren’t chopped liver, either. After putting the miserable 61-game losing streak in the mirror, on Opening Night at Bullitt Central High School, Mark Nelson’s Warren Central squad has proven to be a triumph of the human spirit.

The Dragons scored first, in Thursday night’s loss to East, after senior quarterback Kayumba Jean Aime took his team the length of the field before scoring on a 1-yard run with 7:22 left in the first quarter.

It didn’t take long for Parsley and the Raiders to respond.

The 6-foot-2, 185-pound sophomore quarterback found teammate Tray Price — like Parsley, he’s a three-sport athlete at Warren East — on the right sideline before a missed tackle spelled doom for the Dragons. Price turned the short gain into a 75-yard touchdown reception, at the 6:55 mark of the first quarter, before Iasiah Ghee’s extra point put the Raiders in front 7-6.

“Tray’s one of the most athletic receivers in this part of the state,” Griffith said.

(Warren Central usually opts for the two-point conversion after scoring, and senior receiver Omari Glover couldn’t come up with a circus catch in the left corner of the end zone on a pass from Kayumba Jean Aime.)

Warren East rolled with the momentum, as the Raiders have often done this season.

Jean Aime guided the Dragons’ offense into Warren East territory before he was intercepted by the Raiders’ Gauge Doyle. Parsley needed just five plays to get Warren East into the end zone for a second time, finding Tray Price for a 45-yard completion before senior tailback Quinton Hollis scored on an 8-yard run with 1:23 left in the first quarter.

Parsley, Price and the rest of the Raiders’ offense stayed on the attack, with Parsley converting a fourth-and-six play with a keeper to the right side before Hollis scored from 2 yards out with 8:14 left in the first half.

A.J. Jean Aime found senior WCHS teammate Deanglo Patterson for a pass that covered 31 yards and the Dragons trimmed their deficit to nine points midway through the second half. Aime fired a 19-yard touchdown pass to Demetrius Bennett in the middle of the field before the two-point conversion failed, leaving Warren Central with a 21-12 deficit.

That’s when Dane Parsley and the Raiders took control.

Parsley slipped a pass into the right flat to Isaiah Ghee for an 11-yard touchdown pass with 2:55 left in the half, and Warren Central’s punt put the Raiders at their 20-yard line in the final two minutes of the half.

Tray Price then burned the Dragons on a quick hitch route, hauling in Parsley’s pass near the right sideline before breaking two or three tackles on his way down the right sideline for an 80-yard touchdown reception.

“Early in the game, I was just trying to make some things happen for my team,” Price said afterward. “Defensively, we started kind of slow and I wanted to get some energy for the offense.”

Those were the kinds of plays that left Mark Nelson, Warren Central’s second-year coach, fit to be tied.

“That was caused by us,” Nelson told the Bowling Green Daily News. “They are a good football team and we don’t tackle very well. It’s ridiculous, the way we tackle.”

Warren Central’s Kangakole Jean Aime had a solid return on the ensuing kickoff, only to fumble the ball away to the Raiders. Parsley then lofted a 28-yard touchdown pass to East tailback Quinton Hollis in the middle of the field. Warren East got the ball back in the final minute of the first half, and Parsley scored on a 5-yard run to make it 42-12 at halftime.

In the second half, a fumbled handoff between Parsley and Hollis left the ball at midfield for WCHS defensive back Kangakole Jean Aime. Aime pulled off the scoop-and-score, reaching the end zone on a 49-yard return, before his twin brother Kayumba Jean Aime found receiver Omari Glover for a two-point conversion pass early in the second half.

Senior WCHS cornerback Deanglo Patterson intercepted Parsley on the Raiders’ subsequent possession, at which point the Warren East quarterback spent some solitary moments of self-reflection while his defense went back to work.

A couple minutes later, Parsley made the play of the game.

Parsley followed the blocks of East linemen Riley Odell and Layton Willis to get to the perimeter on a sweep to the left side, and Parsley broke two or even three tackles to get to the left sideline. Parsley then stormed upfield and pulled away from another would-be tackler before scoring on a dazzling 53-yard run with 1:08 left in the third quarter.

“That was a ‘get-off-me’ play,” Warren East tight end Simon Ghee said with a smile.

That was the play, no doubt, that the Raiders fans were talking about when it was over, but it also allowed officials to implement a running clock for the fourth quarter, as per KHSAA guidelines.

Parsley yielded to backup quarterback Brayden Lightfoot midway through the fourth quarter, and the Raiders could complete the task at hand on their way to an open date. Parsley passed for 238 yards on the night, adding another 123 yards and two TDs on the ground.

“I was a little mad, at myself, after the turnovers,” Parsley said. “Warren Central has some good skill players and we definitely could have played better in the second half.”

Perhaps, but Warren East coach Jeff Griffith likes the intangibles Dane Parsley brings to his offense, and the Raiders have scored an amazing 334 points in seven games this season, while surrendering only 65.

That’s a lot of points for the rest of Warren East’s opponents to digest for the stretch run to the playoffs.

“Dane makes those kinds of plays all the time,” Griffith said. “He’s the leader of our team.”

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