Wando last hosted a home game in the S.C. High School football playoffs in 2016.
Many of the Warriors’ current players, including senior fullback Jake Glassberg, would have been just starting their elementary school careers.
On Oct. 30, Glassberg ran for 147 yards and two touchdowns as Wando took aim at that long-awaited home playoff game with a 26-21 victory over Goose Creek in the Warriors’ regular-season finale at District 2 Stadium.
The SCHSL official brackets will be released Saturday, but the 5-5 Warriors are projected to host a playoff game as the No. 8 seed in the Class AAAAA Lower State bracket.
“This unit, we’ve been counted out a lot over the past few years,” said Glassberg, who scored on runs of 32 yards and one yard. “It means a lot to our seniors, because we’re a big senior class and we’ve basically grown up with Coach Perrin. It means a lot to have that home playoff game and have the opportunity to win it.”
Wando, which finished 2-3 in Region 6-AAAAA, beat Fort Dorchester by 31-24 on Sept. 11. The Warriors’ last home playoff game was in 2016, when White Knoll beat Wando by 21-13.
During the Friday night matchup, the Warriors had to fight hard to subdue the Gators (1-9, 0-5), who got 220 yards and a TD from tailback Sincere Lewis. The junior ripped off runs of 78 and 79 yards to set up two of Goose Creek’s three touchdowns.
“We’ve battled with our backs to the wall the whole season,” said Perrin, whose club lost a 42-34 overtime decision at Carolina Forest last week. “All the games we’ve won this year, we’ve been down in those games and come back to win. We were down again tonight at halftime, and had to come back out and score, and then we got the offense going a little bit.”
Goose Creek, in its first season under former Gators standout Jamie Fordham, took a 7-0 lead just before halftime after Hayden Denmark intercepted a Wando pass and ran 52 yards to the Warriors’ 17-yard line. Quarterback Corey Rouse hit receiver Joseph Randolph Jr. for an 18-yard TD with just 29 seconds before intermission.
