By Ray Hamill — The Fortuna Huskies got back to winning ways at McKinleyville on Friday night, while the Del Norte Warriors got their first win of the year and the Ferndale Wildcats continued to roll.
Two weeks after losing to the Ukiah Wildcats and one week after a bye, the Huskies traveled to McKinleyville to take on a Panthers team that was riding high after winning their first three games of the season for the first time in 37 years.
And they came away with a 40-27 win .
Also on the first Friday of inter-league play, the Del Norte Warriors welcomed Arcata to Crescent City and posted their first win of the campaign, cruising to 50-7 victory.
With the win, the Warriors improved to 1-3, while the Tigers dropped to 0-4.
At the Redwood Bowl, the Ferndale Wildcats dominated the Eureka Loggers, scoring seven touchdowns, including four in the second quarter, on the way to a comprehensive 48-12 victory.
With the win, the Cats remain perfect, improving to 4-0, while the Loggers dropped to 1-3.
One week after scoring four touchdowns at Fall River, junior running back Preston Killingsworth found the end zone three more times for Ferndale.
At McKinleyville, the Panthers started strong, scoring on a play action pass on their first play from scrimmage.
But a hungry and determined Fortuna team would respond well despite playing without some key players because of injuries.
Ferndale’s Preston Killingsworth scores on 60-yard TD run against Eureka on Friday night
“It was a good battle and I’m happy to get out of there with the win,” Fortuna head coach Mike Benbow said. “I felt like we came out in the first half and we did kind of what we wanted to do, we controlled the line scrimmage.”
The Panthers would regroup at halftime and continued to battle, remaining in contention until late.
But a fourth-quarter pick six by Kye Hawthorne would help seal the win for the visitors.
The Huskies played without senior quarterback Will Shaw and senior receiver/linebacker Cameron Mclendon, but some of the younger players stepped up in their absence and did a good job, according to Benbow.
Asked what impressed him the most about his team’s performance, Benbow pointed to his players’ collective resiliency.
“I just think the resilience of the guys that had to step in,” he said.
The always-dangerous Easton Essig took over at quarterback and scored on a long TD run, as did junior running back Tiki Bolden.
McKinleyville sophomore quarterback Corbin Green continued to impress and threw for two TD passes while running in for another.
“They battled,” Benbow said of a much improved Panthers team this year. “And they did a good job of adjusting at halftime.”
Gunner Grande and Braylon Sotello each had a TD reception for the Panthers.
But the night belonged to the Huskies, who did just enough to keep McKinleyville at arms length in the second half.
“Any time you have a layoff after a loss, you just want to get back out there, and I was really happy with our effort,” Benbow said. “Our kids persevered.”
The Fortuna JVs also won, 28-20.
Well have more on Friday night’s games on Saturday.
