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I'm running out of things to say about Dudley. The Panthers can do no wrong, it seems, taking out their fourth 4-A power of the season with a 28-21 win over Page on Friday. Pirates coach Kevin Gillespie used the same adjectives to describe the Panthers as everyone else: "Exactly what we expected ... big, strong, fast, physical ... three kids that can run it (Ricky Lewis Jr., J.R. Peterson and Fred Overby, who each deserve more carries than there are to go around)... the best running football team we've seen so far, and it ain't even close." It's so hard to beat a team that moves the ball this well on the ground, because even when it fumbles several times as it did Friday, it's still going to hold the ball most of the evening. That really cuts your margin for error.

I'll say this, though. Page was close. Very close. A play or two earlier in the game could have changed the complexion of the game entirely. The Pirates actually moved the ball very well, especially through the air - Brad Workinger had five catches for 91 yards and two touchdowns, and Colin Daly caught eight balls for 56 yards and a score. That's about as much damage as anyone's inflicted on the Panthers yet. But Dudley did defuse away one very critical weapon in Page's arsenal - it kept Will Newman to a quiet 48 yards rushing. It's much easier to beat the Pirates when Newman's not running around like he's got the opposite magnetic charge of the defense.

Dudley hasn't been blowing teams out, but the mark of a champion is finding a way to prevail when things are tight. With Western Alamance and Northeast Guilford both off last year's 10-win pace, I'd still put my money on the Panthers entering the playoffs undefeated.

For a less wordy description of what it feels like navigating the Panther defense, take a look at slide 5 of Joseph Rodriguez's slideshow of the game.

-The key to Dudley's ground success? The offensive line, duh. But the key to the offensive line? Both Lewis and head coach Stephen Davis and mentioned the team's weight training program, which has evolved significantly under Curtis McMillan since Davis took over. "You can't come in here and expect to beat a team like Page on talent alone," Davis said.

-Page doesn't play again until it hosts Davie County (4-1) on Oct. 3, which will probably feel like an eternity for a team that just let two potentially huge wins slip through its fingers. "It's tough. The guys are down," Gillespie said. "But with this group, I firmly believe they're going to come out, give a good week of practice and be ready to go. They're resilient."

-Get a week's worth of saliva ready, because Friday's Ragsdale-Southeast matchup is suddenly as important a game as there is left on the schedule. It's essentially the Mid-Piedmont 3-A championship. Ragsdale dominated the matchup the first part of the decade, but the home team has won each of the last three seasons. It's at Southeast this year. Falcons quarterback Terrance Topps, who is quickly becoming a folk hero after delivering last-second game-winners each of the last two weeks, will be key. Southern Guilford head coach Darryl Brown said Topps "can stretch the field vertically and open up a lot of stuff with his feet. They didn't have that last year."

-Grimsley's pass offense "wasn't the most sophisticated to begin with anyway," head coach Mark Saunders said last week, but the loss of quarterback Josh Patterson has clearly handcuffed the Whirlies the last two games. They passed the ball just four times against Ragsdale, completing one for three yards. Some mannequins are more proficient with the arm than that. Lashawn Brown and David Ray are a good running tandem, but even Adrian Peterson has a hard time finding space when the defense can put nine men in the box.

-We're so used to seeing East Carolina commitment Scotty Wayne's name in the box score for Southern Guilford - in case you missed it, he had four 30-plus-yard touchdowns Friday - but Darren Garcia's transition from wide receiver to quarterback has been just as pivotal in the Storm's 4-1 start. Two of Wayne's touchdowns Friday came off passes from Garcia, who is definitely still a runner first but has very quickly learned how to manage an offense. "It's probably gone better than we could have ever expected," Brown said. "We're definitely getting more out of him than we would have at wideout."

-Quote of the weekend: "I have never seen an offense play so good and not score a touchdown." -Northwest coach Joe Woodruff, whose team outgained Southeast 301-157 and still lost 10-8.