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By Ron Marvel

Star Correspondent

One more regular season game means one more opportunity to hone your craft, one more chance to do the little things right and one more time to work on your mental focus before the post-season kicks off for these 2023 Happy Valley Warriors. Of course, Friday night will mean one more thing as well; it will provide a stage to honor six seniors who have shown a great deal of grit this season in making this year one to remember in the Valley.

This coming Friday night, the Warriors will welcome the West Greene Buffaloes to Warpath Lane as they close out their regular season before kicking off what they hope is a home playoff game. However, if you have a conversation with Head Coach Jason Jarrett, he will be quick to steer the conversation back to the game at hand. “You know, I’m not even worried about the playoffs this week. I’m worried about West Greene; they are big and strong and well coached with athletes all over the place. We have a nice little run going right now and I told the guys today very bluntly, first, I don’t want us to ever overlook anyone, but I also don’t want the moment to get too big for them. Both of those things require maturity and West Greene should have our full attention,” Jarrett shared. Jarrett also sees this as an opportunity to fine-tool the little things to home in all the fundamentals that will make or break a team this time of the year.

 Coach Jarrett was also quick to bring up his seniors, who have meant so much to this program. “Early on, we talked about this season taking off, but we needed something positive to happen to get us going; we needed that taste of victory. These Seniors stayed the course and are phenomenal men. I told them they were going to have to take this by the horn and lead the way.” It was not long after this meeting that the Warriors picked up their first win, a 38-12 win over ECCA they haven’t lost since. This year’s senior class is made up of Ace Young-WR, Joseph Sowards-RB, JC Andes-DE, Kyler Collins-OL, Zach Stansell-OL and Ben Stansell-DL.

Jarrett also said. With these Warriors winning, many teams are now lining up to give them their best shot. “Cumberland Gap and North Greene both came out and ran it down our throats and scored on us. Our guys have to understand the position we are in, and we have to stay humble,” Jarrett contributed. Coach Jarrett sees a lot in West Greene that could present problems Friday night. “They have size and strength and their guys play as hard as I have seen in the first nine games. They have several weapons you have to account for and an impressive QB that can extend plays and has a strong arm; we have to contain him.” Jarrett added. This is also a West Greene team that can play offense on many different fronts with different looks “we are going to have a play a really good football game if we want to continue to ride this wave of momentum” Jarrett added. It is important to note this is a 3-6 Buffalo team that has lost several close matchups and took South Greene into the fourth quarter before falling 29-14; they also beat Cloudland and put up 28 points on Sullivan East.

 The 6-3 Warriors will kick off Senior Night on Warrior Hill at 7:30 pm.