There are ways to go about learning how to win on the road, and then there&8217;s Franklin County&8217;s basketball teams.

Right now they have no choice.

The Bulldogs and Lady Bulldogs are forced out of their home gym after it suffered water damage during the recent rainstorm that moved through the area earlier this month. Construction crews were in the process of putting on a new roof and repairing damage to the floor from Hurricane Katrina.

Now neither team can play at home, with school officials trying to reshuffle schedules to play many of their first region games on the road.

&8220;We don&8217;t know &8212; it&8217;s in limbo right now,&8221; girls&8217; head coach Charles Moore said. &8220;It buckled in at least five or six places. Right now we&8217;re trying to swap sites. We&8217;re trying to make sure we get the home sites after the first of the year.

&8220;I know our athletic director is looking into options at getting it fixed. We&8217;ll have to look at another school to let us use their gym or a junior college. That&8217;s our only options right now.&8221;

The hard part now, however, is just the daily operations for both varsity squads and the six sub-varsity teams. Both varsity squads are practicing at the elementary and junior high gyms, neither of which are regulation size for a varsity game.

The juggling act involves practice schedules with seventh-, eighth- and ninth-grade teams in both boys and girls with the varsity squads.

&8220;We&8217;re trying to learn how to handle adversity,&8221; Moore said. &8220;It&8217;s a learning lesson. We had to get pretty creative as far as practice schedules and finding time to practice. Now we have to take into consideration the elementary school schedule, also.&8221;

The Lady Bulldogs so far haven&8217;t shown lingering effects of the situation, especially after Thursday&8217;s 74-48 win over Natchez High to go to 2-0 on the season despite losing senior Tamara Gant and two others from last season.

The second quarter was huge against a speed Natchez team, and senior Victoria Hunt led the way with 30 points.

Hunt, a steady 5-8 small forward, is working on her outside game this season to better her chances to play at the next level. Moore said Louisiana Tech has expressed serious interest in Hunt, and she had a visit scheduled for Northwestern State but was unable to make it.

&8220;We&8217;re still looking for that chemistry like everybody else is &8212; which set of players play the best together,&8221; Moore said. &8220;All three of (those seniors) are tough to replace. Tamara was a lot of energy that we&8217;re missing. (Hunt) has worked hard over the summer. She was always able to create shots on penetration. If she wants to play at the next level, she&8217;s got to be able to shoot outside.&8221;

Other games for the Lady Bulldogs are scheduled for the remainder of the month, and they will start out Region 7-3A on the road as scheduled Dec. 6 at Wilkinson County. From there everything still may be up in the air, but both teams will make the best of the situation.

&8220;It&8217;ll wear on us, but hopefully something good will happen for us and we&8217;ll be back at home,&8221; Moore said. &8220;Maybe it&8217;ll make us tougher. You&8217;ve got to learn how to win on the road anyway.&8221;

DROUGHT ENDS &8212; When Eric Richard returned to Block as head boys&8217; coach, he was aware of the Bears&8217; run of futility last season. They went winless on the season at 0-23 &8212; if you don&8217;t count a win over Jena&8217;s junior varsity squad.

But on Friday things changed for the better with a 51-46 win over Sicily Island for the first win. And Richard, a former Monterey coach who left Harrisonburg to return to Block, hopes a sign of better times.

&8220;To get a win and break the ice is big,&8221; he said. &8220;They&8217;re having to learn me, and I&8217;m having to learn them. I can&8217;t ask for a group of more coachable kids. Our goal is not much wins and losses but trying to get better every day. We&8217;re trying to take baby steps, and hopefully we&8217;ll take big-boy steps before long.&8221;

You probably couldn&8217;t have asked for a better opponent to post that first win over, too. Even though Sicily Island has dropped down to Class C, the rivalry between the Tigers and Bears still remains.

And the Bears had to fight for it after trailing 36-33 heading into the fourth quarter.

GROWING PAINS &8212; There&8217;s a sizeable hole in the lineup for the Wilkinson County girls where Latasha Williams was each of the last four years. That may be the Lady Wildcats&8217; biggest priority right now.

They&8217;ve got to find help handling the ball and the press. They struggled in that area Tuesday in a loss at Natchez.

&8220;My sophomores and juniors are really stepping up,&8221; WC head coach Edwin White said. &8220;My seniors are not playing like seniors should be playing. With the loss of Latasha, I only have one ball handler with any kind of speed. We don&8217;t have the go-to player like we had last year, and she took a lot of pressure off everybody else. What we really need is productivity from our seniors.&8221;

NICE, REALLY NICE &8212; You could see from Saturday&8217;s result at Huntington that Riverdale is still a team to beat in Class A and that Trinity&8217;s Lady Saints may have something special going this year.

They landed a 56-41 win over the Lady Rebels Friday night in what had to piqued the interest of coaches in District 4-AA. Riverdale would have scored only 38 points had it not been for Mallory Wiggins&8217; 3-pointer from way out near the end.

&8220;I thought the girls did a beautiful job of picking up the defensive intensity,&8221; Trinity head coach Melanie Hall said. &8220;Riverdale had to work for everything they got they got. I didn&8217;t think they got many open looks the whole night.

&8220;I was really pleased to see the offensive execution coming together. This was the first night the offense jelled. We had the offense jelling with the defensive intensity, and that was just fun.&8221;