Winning a championship felt like a pipe dream for Ben Matheney when he first took over at WCMS five seasons ago. Back then, just winning a game during the season would’ve been nice.

Now, years removed from back-to-back winless seasons, Matheney and the Pioneers are just two wins away from a CTC championship. Warren County will get a chance to play in the CTC playoffs starting Thursday at home against Shelbyville.

The Pioneers and Eagles, along with Tullahoma and Bridgeforth, are the only teams left standing after fall battles on the gridiron. Warren County finished the season 4-3, including going undefeated at Nunley Stadium. The Pioneers will need that home crowd again Thursday when they take on Shelbyville, which beat Warren County 36-8 during the season.

Study sessions started the moment the Pioneers clinched their playoff berth with a 48-30 win over Franklin North last week and the team is completely bought in on doing whatever it takes to stop Tor’rion Mathis and the Eagles this week.

“Practice has gone really well. We’ve already had more time to prepare for this game than we did the last one,” said Matheney. “We had a good hour of film study with them Sunday. I feel like our offense is clicking – our focus now is on no penalties or negative plays. 

"Defensively, this is probably the best game plan we have had and they are picking it up. They are flying to the football and we’re putting players in position to maximize their strengths."

Mathis ran wild in the first meetings, racking up 237 yards and three scores on the Pioneer defense. Warren County has tightened up the run defense since, with Kyler and Kain Carpenter doing major work on the defensive line. Cameron Redmore and Enrique Hernandez are also emerging in the trenches, while LBs Braxton Jordan and Isaiah Keyes get downhill and bring an edge to the team’s defense.

On the backline, AJ Whitman and Daylan Savage are capable of taking any interception to the house, while Rance Stafford has flashed as a shutdown corner.

On offense, the Pioneers couldn’t have asked for a better warm-up game than last week’s triumph over the Gators. Warren County’s offense went wild, piling up a season high in yards and points as the run game went to a new level.

Whitman and Savage had been focal points for most of the season as wings who could get on the edge and take it to the house in an instant, but Huck Damon’s inside running was a revelation against the Gators. The bruising back powered his way to a season-best 175 yards, highlighted by a 92-yard TD run where Damon busted through a pair of tackles at the line of scrimmage and turned on the jets down the field.

Matheney was pleased with the “breakout” game last week, especially as a former lineman who saw his team own the trenches against the Gators. “Our offensive line dominated the line of scrimmage and we are going to have to do that against Harris,” said Matheney about last week’s performance and this week’s upcoming battle.

Nathan Luviano, a team captain that was voted by the players, leads the offensive front for the Pioneers.

Warren County will be looking to take out the back-to-back conference champions at 6:30 p.m. Thursday.