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On Friday night, the Coffee County Red Raiders hit a brick wall in the Page Patriots, losing 42-0 in a non-region contest.

The Patriots were undefeated and had not surrendered a point in their first four games leading up to their Friday night tilt with Coffee County, and during their contest with the Red Raiders, it was easy to see why.

Coffee County would receive the opening kickoff, but their offense went backwards, going three-and-out punting from their own 13.

Page would receive the ball at the Coffee County 30-yard line and take advantage of the good field position, scoring on a rushing touchdown by Colt Brown and hitting the PAT to take a 7-0 lead with three and a half minutes gone by in the first quarter.

The Red Raiders would receive the ball at their own 18 on the kickoff, but the drive would end in another three-and-out, and Coffee County punted the ball to the Patriot 33.

This time, the Patriots would be forced into a three-and-out, punting the ball all the way to the Coffee County seven.

With their own end zone breathing down their neck, the Raiders were pressured hard by the Patriot defense, and a Kaysen Lowery pass found it’s way into the hands of a Page defender. All of a sudden, the Patriots had a 14-0 advantage.

Coffee County would find some offensive momentum on their next drive, fueled by fourth-and-short completion with their “lion” formation to drive themselves into Page territory as the game flipped to the second quarter, but Lowery threw another interception, this time to Knight Wilson, and Page took over on the Raider 33.

The Patriots marched their way deep into the Raider red zone, but Austin Green snagged a pass out of the air for a Red Raider interception on their own nine-yard line.

Coffee County was again forced to punt on their next drive, and the Patriots received the ball at their own 47.

Page would extend their lead on a passing touchdown to Cayden Aukerman, and with over four minutes to play in the first half, the Patriots led 21-0.

The Red Raiders would gain some yardage on their next drive with the help of a roughing the passer penalty, but Coffee County would turn the ball over on downs from their own 36.

With 50 seconds remaining in the half, the Patriots would not let up, beating the clock to score a passing touchdown that was caught by Eric Hazzard to give the Patriots a 28-0 lead at the half.

Out of the halftime break, the Patriots went back to work on offense, as Colt Brown scored his second rushing touchdown of the night to give Page a 35-0 lead with 9:32 left in the third quarter. From there, the running clock started and the rest of the second half went by quickly.

The Red Raiders would punt on their first possession of the second half, and the Patriots scored again on a passing touchdown with 1:20 remaining in the third quarter to build a 42-0 lead.

Coffee County had one more chance to be the first team to score on the Patriots this season, but their final drive of the game ended in a turnover on downs at the Page 48, and from there, the Patriots ran down the rest of the clock to seal a 42-0 victory.

“They’re a great team and they have a lot of future D-1 players on their roster,” Coach Haynes said of Page. “We’ve been dealing with some injuries lately and tonight, we didn’t have the back-ups to go in and play a team like this. It’s my fault, I got out-coached tonight, I’m supposed to have players ready to play and we didn’t have that tonight.”

Coffee County (3-2) will travel to Murfreesboro next week to take on Riverdale (4-1) in their first region road contest of the year. Riverdale will be coming off of a 42-7 district win at Rockvale, and the defending 6A Region 3 Champs will prove to be another tough test for the Red Raiders at the midpoint of their season.

“Going to Murfreesboro is always going to be a big test and the kids have to stand up and accept the challenge,” Haynes said. “We’ve improved a lot from where we were last year, but we still have a long way to go. When you run into a juggernaut like this (Page) and you have nights like this, nothing is ever as bad as it seems and nothing is ever as good as it seems. The kids will be disheartened when they see what they did and what they didn’t do on film, but right now, we’re beat up with some injuries, and we have to get well.”

Kickoff for next week’s contest between the Red Raiders and Warriors will be at 7 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 20 at Phil Watts Stadium’s Tom Nolan Field.