varsity.roanoke.com

The top of the River Ridge District football standings are getting as crowded as rush hour in the Bronx now that Pulaski County has bounced back into the race. The Cougars routed previously undefeated Christiansburg 49-20 on Friday in front of an audience that was considerably less than it was at kickoff, when there wasn't a seat to be had.

Kevin Crouse, the Cougars' sophomore fullback, scored four touchdowns and rushed for 260 yards as the visitors muscled their opponents relentlessly up front.

"Bottom line, we were never able to stop them," Blue Demons coach Tim Cromer said.

As has been its pattern this season, Christiansburg (7-1, 2-1) made things happen in the second half with three touchdowns, the last coming with no time left on the clock. This one was never in doubt, though. The Cougars (7-1, 2-1) led 21-0 at intermission after having held the misfiring Demons to one first down.

"Our best game of the year, no question about it," Pulaski County coach Jack Turner said. "Really, this is the first time that we've had most everybody healthy since the Franklin County game."

Coupled with Salem's victory over Cave Spring, that leaves a three-way tie among the Cougars, Demons and Spartans atop the standings with two games left in the regular season.

Crouse scored a pair of touchdowns in each half and rushed for 155 yards by the break. It was the second week in a row the 5-foot-9, 204-pounder has topped 250 yards rushing. He scored on jaunts of 7, 69, 78, and 3 yards.

"My line is just making things wide-open for me," he said. "And my coaches have done a good job preparing me to expect where the holes are going to be."

Crouse, playing linebacker, also did his share for a defense that at times was as dominant as it has been all year. The Cougars limited the high-powered Demons to 262 total yards, 232 of that coming in the second half. Andrew Hoffer went 10-for-15 for 142 yards and an interception. He threw a third-quarter TD pass of 7 yards to his favorite receiver, end Jacques LaBoone. The sure-handed LaBoone had six catches for 81 yards.

Christiansburg also got a pair of scores from leading rusher Terrell Burkes, who averaged 4.5 yards on 10 carries.

"Christiansburg has a great team," Turner said. "Even when we were up at halftime, I was worried. I know what they can do. They wouldn't have seven victories against the kinds of people they beat if they couldn't play."

Ryan Dean, the Pulaski County quarterback, added a 38-yard TD toss to Will White with 1:05 left before halftime. As he did after all the Cougars' tallies, kicker Luis Piscura booted the extra point.

Dean has struggled occasionally with his passing this season, but he was right on target to the lunging White.

"It's about time," Dean said. "I saw him open and I threw it to him. He made a great effort to get it into the end zone."

The other big story for Pulaski County was defensive end Ernie Hodge, who had three sacks and a number of hurries. One of his sacks forced Hoffer's only fumble, subsequently recovered by Cougar Casey Turpin to set up Crouse's shortest scoring run.

"It really wasn't that hard," Hodge said. "They tried to overblock me, but they couldn't, I guess. We were able to blitz them a lot, too, and that helped me."

Pulaski County 0 21 14 14 - 49

Christiansburg 0 0 14 6 - 20

P - Crouse 7 run (Piscura kick)

P - Crouse 69 run (Piscura kick)

P - White 38 pass from Dean (Piscura kick)

C - Burkes 6 run (Boyd kick)

P - Crouse 78 run (Piscura kick)

P - Crouse 3 run (Piscura kick)

C - LaBoone 7 pass from Hoffer (Boyd kick)

P - Dean 7 run (Piscura kick)

P - Thompson 33 run (Piscura kick)

C - Burkes 2 run (no conversion attempted)

Pulaski Co. C'burg

First downs 19 11

Yards rushing 443 120

Passes C-A-I 1-4-0 10-15-1

Yards passing 38 142

Penalties-yards 5-42 3-25

Fumbles-lost 1-0 1-1

Punts-average 2-36.5 3-39

Individual statistics

RUSHING - Pulaski County, Crouse 20-260, Thompson 15-91, Dean 5-60, Simmons 2-5, Hodge 3-27. Christiansburg, Burkes 10-45, Thompson 5-33, Alcorn 3-50, Hoffer 5-(-8).

PASSING - Pulaski County, Dean 1-4-0-38. Christiansburg, Hoffer 10-15-1-142.

RECEIVING - Pulaski County, White 1-38. Christiansburg, LaBoone 6-81, Thompson 2-45, Collins 1-10, Boyd 1-7.