It had been 686 long days since the Carmi-White County Bulldogs last celebrated a football victory.
That win came on October 18, 2024, a 40-30 win over Eldorado on Senior Night. Noah Pollard rushed for 260 yards and three touchdowns, while Kale Wiggins added 100 yards on another score as CWC closed out the night with a victory.
That victory was followed by nearly two full years of frustration, but the wait finally came to an end last Friday night. The Bulldogs traveled to Hamilton County and held on for a 16-14 victory, snapping the program’s 13-game losing streak and giving CWC its first win of the 2026 season.
Now, with the 2026 season already one-third of the way complete, the 1-2 Bulldogs will look to make it two straight when they welcome the Red Hill Salukis to the friendly confines of Harrington-Jeffries Stadium on Friday night.
Like the Bulldogs, Red Hill is also coming off its first victory of the season.
The Salukis picked up their first win last Friday night, cruising past Sesser-Valier 32-8 at home. Red Hill enters Friday’s game with a 1-2 record and will be looking to carry the momentum into the trip to Carmi.
The Salukis are in a similar position to where Carmi-White County found itself a year ago, attempting to rebuild after graduating a large senior class.
Red Hill had 15 seniors on their roster last season, all of whom played a role in helping the Salukis reach the playoffs and finish the 2025 campaign with a 5-5 record.
The blue and red Dawgs do bring back a couple of big-time contributors from last year, including 1st Team All-BDC center DJ Brashear along with running backs Colby Crutchfield and Levi McCullough.
Crutchfield has been one of Red Hill’s more productive offensive weapons through the first three weeks of the season. He has rushed for 99 yards on 15 carries with one touchdown, while also making three receptions for 49 yards and another score.
McCullough has carried the ball seven times for 16 yards and a touchdown, while adding one reception. Those statistics are just from Weeks 2 and 3.
Junior Brayden Carie has also emerged as an impact player in the Red Hill offense. Carie has rushed for 69 yards on 13 carries while adding two receptions for 34 yards.
Handing and throwing the ball to guys like Crutchfield, McCullough, and Carie is sophomore quarterback Easton Dowty. So far this season, Dowty has thrown for 157 yards and 2 touchdowns with 2 interceptions.
CWC head coach Clinton Wolff knows the Bulldogs will have to account for Dowty’s ability to move around the field.
“Their quarterback is a young kid, he’s pretty salty,” Wolff said. “He will run the ball a little bit. They’ll run a little bit of option, and they’ll get him out moving the pocket a little bit in their pass game.”
The Bulldogs’ pass defense will be something to watch after Hamilton County found some success through the air last week. The Foxes finished the game with 124 passing yards and a touchdown, giving CWC another area to clean up heading into Friday night.
Wolff knows Dowty and the Red Hill passing attack will present a challenge.
“He does throw the ball effectively, we’ll have to do a good job in our pass coverage making sure we’re where we need to be,” Wolff said.
While the Bulldogs certainly have things they would like to clean up from last week’s win, the most important thing was finally getting back into the win column.
CWC didn’t necessarily play its cleanest game against Hamilton County, but when the Bulldogs needed to make plays, they found a way to get the job done, something that was often missing during last year’s winless campaign.
“I felt like there were definitely opportunities for us to play better football and the outcome maybe wouldn’t have been as close as it was,” Wolff said. “With that said, our kids did what they needed to do to find a way to win the game, and those were things we were unable to do last year.”
For the Bulldogs, Friday night is another opportunity to show that last week’s win was more than just the end of a long losing streak, but the start of a winning streak.
Kickoff is set for 7:00 PM. Fans can listen to the game on 97.3 FM WRUL or watch it live on the WRUL Sports YouTube Channel.
The Taylor Eye Care Pregame Show will begin at 6:30 PM.