VIDALIA, La. &045; It’s been the place of broken dreams, busted hopes and the road to seemingly nowhere.

It’s West St. John, and many teams over the years have had unpleasant rides back over the Mississippi River either by ferry or by the Welcome bridge upriver in St. James Parish to end a season.

They often left with the following arguments:

4Which bites harder, the mosquitoes there or the charging defensive linemen?

4Which is louder, the roar of the train nearby or the crowd when the Rams score a touchdown?

The Vidalia Vikings, however, are aiming at bucking the trend. The Rams are seeking another trip to the state championship game after making numerous appearances there in the 1990s &045; many of which were losses to Evangel when the Eagles started out in Class 1A.

The Vikings are making their first trip to the state semifinals since 1966 after executing near flawlessly Friday in a 46-12 trouncing of Mamou.

&uot;Looking forward to it,&uot; fullback Chris Williams said. &uot;Absolutely looking forward to it. I’m looking forward to it, and we’re ready to go. We’ll go in there and give it our best. Hopefully we’ll come out on top.&uot;

For the first time this season the Vikings, who finished the regular season ranked No. 1 in the state with the Rams ranked second, will come into a game as the underdog.

The Rams have mauled their competition throughout the playoffs &045; a combined score of 130-36 &045; and have a number of Division I prospects, including 6-6, 270-pound Tyson Jackson at defensive tackle and 6-3, 225-pound Quinn Johnson at fullback/linebacker, who have both committed to LSU.

Not to be undaunted, the Vikings may be the best team the Rams have faced so far in the playoffs as the Rams’ playoff wins have come over No. 31 seed Ferriday (42-0), No. 15 seed Port Barre (41-22) and No. 10 seed Sumner (47-14).

&uot;You know what I call them? LSU JV,&uot; remarked VHS head coach Dee Faircloth. &uot;They’re loaded. They’ve got six Division-I prospects. Two of them have committed to LSU, and my guys have committed to Whatsamatter U. We don’t have any prospects.&uot;

MESSAGE BOARD SQUABBLE &045; When it came to getting fired up to face the Mamou Green Demons on Friday, Vidalia coaches didn’t have to get out of their chair.

Postings on a message board on kenramsey.com, a Web site devoted to Louisiana high school athletics, provided all the words the team needed to hear to get their blood going.

So when the Vikings ran for 311 yards in Friday’s win, you can imagine the activity on the site heated up significantly.

&uot;We had a big challenge,&uot; Faircloth said. &uot;We look at Ken Ramsey, and there was a big challenge on there &045; ‘There’s no way you’re going to run on Mamou. There’s no way you’ll run on those guys because Iota had a fourth down and a foot twice and didn’t make it.’ I guess it was a challenge.&uot;

Some of the Vidalia coaches hollered it during the game Friday, but, you know, it’s not trash talk if it’s true. The Vikings did run on the Green Demons, and Michael Randall’s 228 yards on 21 carries were enough to put a hurt on the defense.

Many of those yards came in the second half after the Vikings were pretty balanced in the first.

&uot;Everything was just working for us,&uot; said quarterback Tony Hawkins, who threw 13 passes in the first half and just two in the second. &uot;The line did a great job, and we’ll go as far as the line will take us. We were up at half, and we were going to try and milk the clock. Michael did a great job. We passed the ball mainly in the first half, but I told him the second half was his half to do his thing.&uot;

Randall’s second-half exploits hit the Green Demons where it hurts. They had the momentum after scoring on the first drive of the second half when Andre Doucet’s 6-yard TD run capped a 10-play, 55-yard drive to cut the lead to 21-12, but Randall took the first play from scrimmage after that and busted a 65-yard touchdown run.

The Demons then fumbled, and Randall took the first play from scrimmage again for a touchdown, this time for 48 yards. Both were the same plays with Randall running around the right side.

&uot;They came right back and scored,&uot; Mamou head coach Joel Desselle said. &uot;I think they scored three touchdowns on six plays, and that basically put the game away. We just got beat by a better team. You don’t win 13 games by accident. We tried a few stunts and blitzes that didn’t really work. They ran right into our blitz but underneath our blitz. They called good plays for the defenses we called.&uot;

ONSIDE THAT WASN’T &045; The two quick touchdowns were crushing enough, but the Vikings recovered what was interpreted as an onside kick after that to set up another score.

Since the Green Demons were returning kicks for good yardage in the first half, the instructions were for Williams to start pooch kicking it to keep it away from their fast return guy.

After Randall’s second touchdown Williams was set to skip one off the ground for a pooch, but the kick wasn’t right. It instead went for short yardage against a Mamou team that was ill-prepared for an onside kick.

Senior James Clem came up with the ball at the Mamou 44.

&uot;It was supposed to be a pooch kick, and it went off the side of my foot,&uot; Williams said. &uot;James recovered it. He works hard every day in practice.&uot;

The play worked, and four plays later the Vikings put it in the end zone again &045; their third score in a stretch of 3 1/2

minutes.

&uot;We had no intentions of kicking an onside kick,&uot; Faircloth said.