The Warren East football team has been the best of the rest in district play behind defending Class 4A state champion Franklin-Simpson the last two seasons, but it hasn’t translated to postseason success.

The Raiders have dropped opening-round home matchups to Hopkinsville the past two seasons and have lost three straight opening-round matchups to the Tigers.

Raiders coach Jeff Griffith is hopeful his team is ready to take the next step – challenging the top dog in the district and parlaying that into postseason success.

“With Franklin, they have been head and shoulders above everyone else in our district,” Griffith said. “Two through four, and now you add Russell County to the mix, it has been very competitive. We are all hoping on making up some ground on them, in terms of us moving forward and maybe they come to the pack a little bit, to make the competition for the top spot in the district a little more competitive because it hasn’t been the past couple of years.”

If Warren East hopes to improve on last year’s 6-5 season, the Raiders will have to replace do-everything running back Thomas Maxey, who ran for more than 1,700 yards and scored 26 touchdowns.

“It’s going to be difficult,” Griffith said. “He was a special guy with the ball in his hands. He also had a really good offensive line to run behind. We basically lost three senior linemen that were really good. We lost Maxey, who was really good, and we are losing our leading receiver (Jastin Proctor). I don’t think we are going to be able to replace Thomas Maxey with one person. He was a special guy that had a special season last year.”

Griffith will turn to a trio of running backs in senior Damontra Pillow and juniors K.J. Alexander and Daveon Davis to get the bulk of the carries to start the season.

The quarterback position is set with junior Nolan Ford returning under center. Ford threw more than 1,500 yards and 17 touchdowns last season while rushing for almost 400 yards.

“In high school football, you can’t put a price on having a quarterback with experience,” Griffith said. “You are talking about a guy who is going to be a junior and he’s already started 17 varsity games. He’s going to have to be a big part of our offense. We have high expectations for him as a leader and his production this year.”

Junior Seth Blaine, a three-year starter, will lead the way for a trio of talented tight ends that also include senior Daointe Donan and freshman Simon Ghee.

Juniors DeSean Gilbert and Kenaz Huskey, senior Logan Sanders and sophomore Kavon Faison are among the wideouts at Ford’s disposal with senior Zach Segur and Jordan Brown returning to anchor both the offensive and defensive lines.

The defense also includes a strong and experienced secondary in Pillow, plus seniors EJ Smith and Memphas Hite. The linebacking unit includes Blaine, senior Zach Tompkins and a pair of basketball players joining the football team this season – seniors Ryan Carter and Bo Yoakem.

“We’ve got guys that have never played before, but we like where they are right now,” Griffith said. “They just need to play in live games and learn the speed of the game.”

And Griffith is hopeful that learning process will lead to success in district play – which would translate to possible postseason success with the first two rounds of the playoffs now against district foes.

“I’m not a fan of playing inter-district in the first two rounds of the playoffs,” Griffith said. “At the same time, the last two years we would have played Allen County again. If that was who we ended up playing again then it would probably be a great competitive game with a good crowd. Then the winner would likely play Franklin.

“Ultimately it doesn’t matter who you have to play, you just have to win some games in the playoffs to get to where you want to get. We have not been successful with that the first couple of years I’ve been here in terms of winning a playoff game. That’s what we want to get done this year.”

Ford said the early exits have been a driving force for a team looking for its first postseason win since 2014.

“I think we are really motivated,” Ford said. “With the way our schedule is set up we have some tough games, but I think we know that we can have a very good season and then go into the playoffs and keep winning and keep playing.”

Warren East 2019 Schedule

Aug. 23 – Russellville

Aug. 30 – vs. South Warren

Sept. 6 – Logan County

Sept. 13 – at Greenwood

Sept. 20 – Russell County

Sept. 27 – at Edmonson County

Oct. 3 – at Warren Central

Oct. 18 – Allen County-Scottsville

Oct. 25 – at Franklin-Simpson

Nov. 1 – at Daviess County{&end}