Sabine looks for another 'W' at Winona

Photo by Lester Murray HERE'S WHAT WE DO — Sabine High School head football coach Jerry Baker (right) talks with Logan Edmondson between plays last Friday night in the Cardinals' District 18-2A opener against Union Grove. Sabine lost the game, 21-0, snapping a two-game winning streak. The Cards (2-2) visit Winona on Friday night, a 7:30 p.m. kickoff. Before you can run, you've got to learn to walk. It's a fact of life.

And it's true in football, too.

Sabine High School head coach Jerry Baker, in his first season, is guiding the young Cardinals along the way. And while there are going to be ups (wins over Troup and Beckville) and downs (last week's homecoming loss to Union Grove), there needs to be growth.

The Cardinals are definitely growing, and learning a little more every week. This week, they visit Winona, an unbeaten team with a District 18-2A championship on its mind.

Game time at Winona will be 7:30 p.m.

Winona has been a tough nut to crack all season, and apparently, it all starts with defense. Winona is 4-0, and in those four games, no team has scored more than eight points. Last week in a defensive battle with coach Roger Adams' New Diana team, Winona escaped with a 6-0 win to open 18-2A play.

In Liberty City, though, Sabine's defense was on the field for much of the game, and that wasn't a good thing. Union Grove played a methodical ball-control game, holding the ball for all but eight plays of the first half and leaving Liberty City with a 21-0 win over the Cardinals. And in it, Sabine had just 103 yards of total offense.

Union Grove had 19 first downs, 202 rushing yards (113 of it by tailback Richard Pittman), and only threw the ball three times. Sabine had just seven first downs, and the leading rusher was quarterback Jacob Kenna, who had 35 yards on seven carries.

UG's Lions had a 71-yard touchdown run by quarterback Dalton Melton called back on a penalty early in the game, but would score on the drive, anyway. The Lions didn't so much blow Sabine out as they did put together a slow, steady offensive attack that simply didn't allow Sabine time to execute its offensive game plan. over Beckville, Sabine quarterback Lie'Quan Byrd threw for three touchdowns. The Cards have two players at quarterback (Byrd and Jacob Kenna) who can both run the offense, and a tailback, Bernard Alexander, who can be very effective, as well.He had 79 yards and a score on 16 carries in the Beckville game.

Sabine had 340 yards of total offense in that contest, and put up more points than they had since the 2005 season.

For Sabine defensively, Jurray Todd had eight solo tackles and 11 total tackles. Marc Cunningham had 10 total tackles. Terrance Daniels had four tackles and a fumble recovery, one of the few Union Grove miscues on the night.

Last week, the Cardinals saw their two-game winning streak come to an end. This week, they'd love to start another. The next few weeks won't be easy: a home game against Harleton Oct. 10, a road trip to Harmony Oct. 17, and a home game against