FERRIDAY &8212; There was a bad taste lingering from the end of the regular season. But when the bracket came out and Jewel Sumner was away from just about everyone they wanted to be, the Cowboys had a good feeling.

Things may be all right after all.

Just for good measure, however, head coach Mark Catalanotto brought his club to Concordia Parish early Friday and actually spent a good portion of the afternoon at the Vidalia riverfront. It&8217;s a new season, and new territory comes with it.

And after Friday night, a new frame of mind. The Cowboys executed well on both sides of the ball to knock off No. 11 seed Ferriday 16-7 in the opening round of the Class 2A playoffs.

&8220;They&8217;ve been in the playoffs every year they&8217;ve been here,&8221; Catalanotto said of his 25th-seeded club. &8220;Everybody was pretty loose. Nobody was tight. We went out to the riverfront, laid around and enjoyed it. We played two pretty good teams (last two weeks) and gave up some big plays.

&8220;We caught a pretty good draw. Not to disrespect Ferriday, but they hadn&8217;t been in the playoffs in a while. We&8217;re tickled to death to be where we are, and we were fortunate enough to come out of here with a win.&8221;

The Cowboys (5-3) made the plays when they had to and held a Ferriday offense that had scored 152 points in its last three games to only seven. The Trojans were plagued by mistakes, and the Cowboys were there each time to capitalize.

Penalties, bad snaps on punts and missed tackles made the Trojans&8217; first trip to the postseason since 2002 a brief one.

&8220;We had some big mistakes at crucial times,&8221; FHS head coach James McFarland said. &8220;We had never made this many mistakes. We got a turnover and then got a 30-yard loss. Then we still had some good plays but had some dropped balls and that kind of thing. Just one of those things &8212; what could go wrong did go wrong.&8221;

The Trojans had big gains but never could sustain anything and get it going in the right direction. The biggest missed opportunity came in the fourth when Demetrius White recovered a fumble near midfield to give the Trojans the ball with 4:45 left in the game trailing 14-7.

Quarterback Terrance Johnson scrambled on the first play and wound up being tackled for a 25-yard loss. The Trojans threw two incompletions before disaster struck in the form of a bad snap on a punt &8212; their third bad snap in as many tries.

The ball sailed over Dra&8217;Carl Walker&8217;s head, and he had to kick it out of the end zone for a safety at the 3:30 mark.

&8220;It was a lot of mistakes,&8221; Ferriday senior Montago Tennessee said. &8220;We could have come back and won, but we had penalty after penalty. The reason why they won this game was they made the most plays. When you have to make plays, we didn&8217;t make plays. They made some plays, and we didn&8217;t do anything to stop them.&8221;

Even on the final drive the Trojans caught a little momentum when Johnson hit little Alonzo Booth for a 50-yard gain that got them inside the 20 with under a minute to go. But Johnson was tackled just short of the first on the Sumner 9 on fourth down to end the drive.

It was the Trojans&8217; second time inside the Sumner 10 that yielded no points.

&8220;We played our defense,&8221; Catalanotto said. &8220;They can spread the field out, go in two tights and a power I. When you stop and look at it, against the two tight ends they matched up with their two backs up front. I think we kind of took them out of that early, and they had to spread things out. Then it came down to desire. The kids played their hearts out.&8221;

Mistakes on Ferriday&8217;s part led to both Sumner scores in the first and fourth quarters. Walker took a high snap on a punt, turned to try and run but fell down for an 18-yard loss that gave the Cowboys the ball at the FHS 43.

After going mostly with Devin Coleman with the run, the Cowboys faked off him and went with Darien Dyson, who ran three times for 33 yards to get down to the Ferriday 4. Coleman then ran in a fourth down from the 2 for a touchdown to break a 7-7 tie with 9:22 left in the fourth.

The first score came in the first quarter when Walker snagged a high snap but got off a short punt to give the Cowboys the ball at the FHS 36. Six plays later Shedrick Briggs ran in from 1 yard out for the 7-0 lead.

&8220;We hadn&8217;t had a special teams problem all year,&8221; McFarland said. &8220;Tonight we had two. Not having to punt the last three weeks may have hurt us.&8221;

The Trojans scored on the first play of the second half when Johnson broke a 67-yard run.