LUMBERTON — Just 14 miles separate Lumberton High School’s Alton G. Brooks Stadium and Fairmont’s Hal S. Floyd Stadium. But it’s been a long time since either school’s football team has made the short trek on Highway 41 to play the other.

Until now.

Friday, some 5,089 days after their previous meeting, the Pirates will host the Golden Tornadoes in both teams’ season opener. Kickoff is slated for 7:30 p.m.

“As soon as Lonnie (Cox) got the (Fairmont) job, both of us were interested in getting that back going, with the contract coming up,” Lumberton coach Adam Deese said. “He’s the first person I contacted. It’s something that needed to be renewed, and I think it’s great for the community. We’re excited about that and I think it’ll be a spark plug for both programs.”

“We just saw it as very imperative to reunite and play every year,” Fairmont coach Lonnie Cox said. “I think it serves as an exciting opening game for both teams and both communities, and honestly I think it gives both schools a chance to put quite a bit of money in their back pocket, which will help with expenses throughout the whole season.”

The teams were originally scheduled to play last season before the Pirates program was forced into quarantine due to COVID-19 protocols.

Cox was a senior on the Golden Tornadoes team the last time the programs met, on Sept. 12, 2008; Lumberton won that game 42-6. Lumberton offensive coordinator Doug Taylor was teammates with Cox two years earlier at Fairmont; Cox is also a former assistant coach at Lumberton, which was his first coaching job.

“That school and that community means a lot to me and they were imperative and helping make me the man which I am,” Cox said. “I just think it’s an incredible opportunity for both of these communities to get together and share a football game Week 1.”

Both teams begin a new season after a disappointing few years; Fairmont was 2-7 and Lumberton was 1-8 last fall.

Since the amount of information each coach has on the other team is limited to what was seen in scrimmages last week, both teams are focusing on themselves in the days leading up to Friday’s game. For Lumberton, that comes down to how the team approaches this and every game.

“We’re just looking at our guys and making sure we approach everything business-like,” Deese said. “That’s the next step here in this program is our guys approaching ballgames the right way, with the right mentality. That’s going to be our biggest challenge this week is making sure everybody’s tuned in on what they’re supposed to do, their assignments, their techniques, and everything else will take care of itself.”

Cox, meanwhile feels Fairmont is prepared for whatever Lumberton, or any other future opponent, throws its way.

“Offensively we have a system; we have answers for man coverage, for cover-3, for quarters coverage, for three-man fronts, four-man fronts,” Cox said. “We’re constantly working on our system offensively to make sure we can be prepared for anything that anybody shows us. Defensively, Coach (Eric) Gould has the same kind of system in place. We are who we are, and because we’re very good at the core of what we do, we feel like we can line up against anything anybody shows us.”

What each coach did see from the other program in scrimmage play, they were complimentary of. Cox said Lumberton’s running game is what the Golden Tornadoes will need to contain.

“We think Lumberton has a two-headed monster in Jacoby Pevia and Chris McCallum, and it’s going to be a tall task to stop both of them on the option,” Cox said. “We thought that Lumberton was really successful in their scrimmage against West Bladen running the option, so it’ll be very important for us defensively to play assignment football and to make sure that we’ve got hats on the dive, quarterback and the pitch every play.”

Deese said Fairmont is an athletic team and it will be critical for the Pirates to avoid letting Golden Tornadoes players get the ball in the open field.

“They’ve got a lot of athletes, and they try to get their athletes in space and to make plays when they get the ball. We’ve got to be sound on the defensive end,” Deese said. “On the offensive end, we’ve got to make sure we limit turnovers; that’s been our Achilles heel for the last two years. If we manage to control the clock offensively, and the defense manage to create some takeaways, I think we’ll put ourselves in a good scenario.”

Lumberton leads the all-time series 9-3, and has won nine straight games dating back to Fairmont’s most-recent win in the series in 1975. Since, the programs have met in 1976-78, 1991-92, 2001-02 and 2007-08.

While some games in the Sandhills region have been moved to Thursday due to the possibility of inclement weather on Friday night, all four games involving Robeson County schools are still scheduled for 7:30 p.m. on Friday as of press time on Tuesday evening.

Douglas Byrd at Red Springs

Tim Ray’s tenure as the Red Springs head coach begins in earnest when the Red Devils host Douglas Byrd Friday.

Both teams are coming off disappointing seasons. Red Springs was 1-6 last fall in a campaign heavily affected by injuries and COVID-19 issues among the team. Douglas Byrd was 1-9 last season.

Red Springs’ one 2021 win came against the Eagles, a 22-8 victory in the season opener; that game is the only previous meeting between the programs. Douglas Byrd defeated Purnell Swett 6-3 on Oct. 22.

The Eagles will be seeking improvement in the program’s second season under coach Maurice Huey; running back Sincere Blount is a key returner.

St. Pauls at Metrolina Christian

Two-time defending conference champion St. Pauls begins its season with a nonconference road trip Friday, traveling to Indian Trail to face Metrolina Christian Academy.

Metrolina Christian, which competes in the North Carolina Independent School Athletic Association, was 10-2 last season. The Warriors and Bulldogs have never met on the gridiron.

Warriors quarterback Reid Eighmy returns after a 1,743-yard passing performance last season; Jeremy Williams led the team in rushing last fall as a freshman.

St. Pauls’ Kemarion Baldwin is 138 yards from reaching 4,000 career rushing yards, and is 410 yards away from passing former teammate Marquiese Coleman as both the St. Pauls and Robeson County all-time rushing leader.

Seaforth at Purnell Swett

Purnell Swett may be beginning its season Friday, which in itself is a fresh start — but they’ll face a team playing its first varsity football game in program history. Seaforth will visit Pembroke as it debuts at the varsity ranks on Friday.

Seaforth, located in Pittsboro, opened in 2021. The Hawks compete in the North Carolina High School Athletic Association’s 2A classification.

Purnell Swett’s first game comes far earlier than it did last season, when the team was forced into quarantine three times due to virus protocols before finally playing its first game on Oct. 2. The Rams were 1-5 last fall.

Entering the new season, head coach Stephen Roberson expects Jeremiya Dial to get the bulk of the carries for the Rams offense, and for the defensive line to be one of the team’s strengths.