Keaton Sanders has taken his share of lumps since being thrust into the starting quarterbacking job as a sophomore.

On Friday, he answered those critics.

Sanders tossed a 39-yard touchdown pass, scored on a 2-point conversion run in which he barreled over several defenders and led Warren Central to a 21-12 Red Carpet Bowl victory over Clarksdale at Memorial Stadium.

“Keaton deserves all the accolades he can get right now,” Warren Central coach Curtis Brewer said. “He has been given a bad rap these last two years, but people don’t understand that we threw him into the fire as a sophomore. This is his best game.”

Sanders completed 9 of 17 passes for 110 yards and helped the Vikings turn a first half of offensive misery into a second half of celebration.

“We needed to settle down and get things going,” Sanders said of the second-half turnaround which saw WC score all of its points except three in the third quarter.

After being held to 99 yards of offense in the first half, the Vikings opened the second in the shotgun. A pair of Joel Forbes runs and a completed pass set up Sanders’ 39-yard strike to Larry Davis, who made a nifty juke move to slip past Clarksdale defenders and slice the deficit to 12-7 with 9 minutes, 37 seconds to play in the third quarter.

Local scores

WC 21, Clarksdale 12

PCA 17, River Oaks 15

Bogue Chitto 34, St. Al 21

Tallulah  20, Claiborne 6

Briarfield 42, SIA 20

Jared Thames boomed the first of his two field goals — a 34-yarder — seven minutes later to get the deficit down to two. WC forced a punt and Forbes barreled 43 yards on the fourth play from scrimmage to give WC a 16-12 lead. Sanders then ran over defenders for the 2-point score to take an 18-12 lead.

“I felt like Tim Tebow,” Sanders said with a chuckle in reference to the University of Florida quarterback and Heisman Trophy winner who has made a name for himself by taking on defenders at the  goal line.

Thames added a late fourth-quarter field goal, a 28-yarder, to close out the game.

Thames second field goal also put the icing on a dominating defensive effort in the second half. Clarksdale had only 67 yards of total offense in the second half and did not seriously threaten to score. The two Wildcat scores came in the second quarter on odd plays.

Clarksdale punted to Warren Central, but a kick-catch interference call against the Wildcats gave them possession again, but backed up 15 yards to punt again. Freshman Larry Mitchell faked the punt, then scampered 55 yards down the home sideline for a 6-0 lead with 7:37 left in the first half.

Six minutes later, Chris Clay ran in from 5 yards out and barely crossed the goal line before losing the ball out of bounds. Clarksdale took a 12-0 lead into halftime and kept WC’s defense on the field for more than 15 minutes of the first half.

“We were a little tired, but we came through in the second half,” said WC linebacker Derrick Stamps, who had a sack.

Forbes led all rushers with 116 yards on 13 carries, while the freshman Mitchell paced Clarksdale with 87 yards on eight carries. Cordell Valentine caught five passes for 52 yards for WC.

“This is a very big win for our program because we get to start the season off for a change on a positive note,” Brewer said. “It’s important to our coaches, our players and our fans. They have always given us the support we needed and it’s nice to start off on a positive note.”