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JONESVILLE, La. — After having to wait nearly a full day to resume because of a surprising power outage, the Ferriday High School Trojans and the Block High School Bears resumed their varsity football game known as the Black River Classic late last Saturday afternoon.

And the delay did not bother Ferriday High School in the least bit as senior quarterback Caleb Ellis threw for 357 yards and six touchdowns to four different receivers on 17-of-25 passing as the Trojans cruised to a 46-6 victory over the Block Bears.

As to when the game was actually scheduled to restart after all the lights went out at Block High School’s football stadium, Ferriday assistant coach DeVante Scott and Block head coach Samel Washington gave vastly different reasons.

“We had a coin toss to determine when we would resume. If we (Ferriday) won the coin toss, we would start at 10 a.m. If they (Block) won the coin toss, the game would start at 6 p.m. We won the toss. But Block had called us later on and they didn’t want to play at 10 a.m. They forced us to start at 6 p.m.,” Scott said.

“We talked with the head referee at 9 a.m. (Saturday) morning,” Washington said. So the game started back up at 6 p.m.

As to what caused the lights to go out in the first place at 7:32 p.m. last Friday, Washington said, “All I know is a line went down on a back road. Light went out in the entire parish. I’m not from here. The lights came back on later that night. They were out all over town.”

As for the game itself, which resumed with Ferriday leading 8-0 with about three minutes left in the first quarter, Block scored a touchdown, but missed the two-point conversion to still trail 8-6.

After that, Ferriday pretty much had its way with Block, especially during a 22-point second quarter which gave the Trojans a commanding 30-8 halftime lead.

“We were working on what we were supposed to do, so it really didn’t bother us,” Scott said.

The Trojans scored a touchdown and added an ensuing two-point conversion in both the third and fourth quarters.

Desmen Jefferson led the Trojans in receiving with five catches for 129 yards and two touchdowns. Senior athlete Jerry Griffin had three receptions for 68 yards and two touchdowns to go with four rushes for 36 yards.

Robert Taylor had three catches for 70 yards and one receiving touchdown to go with a 30-yard TD run with about eight minutes left In the first quarter when the game started last Friday night. Paityn Collins had two catches for 70 yards and one touchdown.

As for Ellis’s performance, Scott said, “Caleb played great. Four or five of those incompletions were drops. It wasn’t anything that he did wrong.”

Taevion Edwards was the leading rusher for the Trojans with 11 carries for 74 yards. CJ Reed Jr added three carries for 33 yards. As a team, they racked up 148 yards on the ground and finished with 505 yards of total offense.

“We did better (running the ball) than we did against Vidalia. We’ve still got a few things to work on,” Scott said.

Christopher Sheppard Jr. led the Trojans’ “JYD” defense with five and a half tackles while Darriyon Brown and Khilyn Davis each stepped up with big-time performances. Brown had two tackles, one pass break-up, one fumble recovery, and one interception. Davis had three and a half tackles, one sack, one forced fumble, and one fumble recovery.

“Very pleased with the defense. Held them to six points. We did a good job containing their running quarterback,” Scott said.

Despite the lopsided final score, Washington said it wasn’t a bad game considering how young the Bears are this season.

“We’re a young group. I have five upperclassmen. It was a pretty good game for a young team,” Washington said. “We’ve got to learn to finish the game. We’ve got some things we’ve gotta work on and keep going. Our defense played pretty good. We’ve got to keep our emotions in check.”

Even though Block was able to get into Ferriday’s red zone a couple of times during the game, the Trojans’ defense kept the Bears out of the end zone. Scott said penalties had a lot to do with the Bears getting that far into Trojans territory.
“Twenty penalties for 240 yards is very rare. We had to keep them level-headed. They play with a lot of passion. We’re flying to the ball, but we’ve got to tackle better. We had too many missed tackles,” Scott said.

While the Trojans were penalized that many times, Washington said that Block was only penalized four or five times.

Ferriday (2-0) plays host to Delta Charter School on Friday at 7 p.m. in what’s being billed as the “Battle of Ferriday.” Block (0-2) plays host to Vidalia High School at 7 p.m. Friday.