WAVERLY — The Miami Trace Panthers began the 2021 football season Friday, making the trip down into Pike County to take on the Waverly Tigers.

Waverly went 8-1 last year with a huge 36-35 win over Wheelersburg and won two playoff games before falling to Clinton-Massie, 31-28.

Waverly averaged 45 points per game last year, while allowing an average of 19 points per game.

It was a tough go for Miami Trace as the Tigers defeated the Panthers, 42-3.

Junior Zach Warnock connected on the field goal for the Panthers.

“Waverly is a good football team, a real good football team,” Miami Trace head coach Jerry Williams said. “We certainly didn’t play to our ability.

“We had some key injuries going into the game, but, we can’t let that affect us as much as we did,” Williams said. “We’ve got to be able to step up and make plays.

“We shot ourselves in the foot many times with penalties when we were moving the ball,” Williams said. “We had a tremendous amount of penalties that hurt us — holding, a block in the back — things like that on big gains and it just took the momentum away from us.

“When we had opportunities, we hurt ourselves,” Williams said. “Coach Crabtree has a good football team over here. They are going to be able to challenge just the way they did last season”

In FAC and area games Thursday night, Jackson trounced Logan, 42-7.

Paint Valley beat Blanchester, 35-7.

On Friday night, Washington defeated Bexley, 20-13; Western Brown pummelled Hillsboro, 62-21.

Piketon beat Minford, 28-6 and Vinton County got by Unioto, 12-7. Ironton beat Wheelersburg, 40-6 and Circleville shut out Huntington, 35-0.

Teays Valley topped Chillicothe, 28-17.

Miami Trace will have its home opener next week against former SCOL rivals Wilmington.