After a long wait, Pine Bluff High School’s home football opener has arrived.
The Zebras will host Jacksonville at Simmons Bank Field for each team’s conference opener at 7 p.m. Pine Bluff (0-3) spent the first two weeks of the season traveling out of state before making a shorter trip to Camden Fairview two weeks ago. Now, the Zebras finally get to play in front of their home fans for the first time in 2025. This will be one of just three home games for Pine Bluff this season, and head coach Micheal Williams said that makes it critical for the Zebras to play well in the few they have.
“The ones that we do get are the ones we know we need to have,” Williams said. “If we want to get our fans back on our side, we definitely gotta win these. The three that we have is this first one against Jacksonville, which is a huge one, and then we got homecoming and then senior night. So, all three of them are huge home games.”
After this game, the Zebras will be on the road again the next two weeks before playing their other two home games back-to-back. Pine Bluff will finish with two more road games, though the regular season finale will be a short trip across the county to White Hall. Pine Bluff was off last week following back-to-back close losses. The Zebras fell 27-20 in overtime at Dallas Kimball in Texas before losing 26-22 at Camden Fairview.
Williams said his team spent the bye week working on basics, and now the Zebras need to show they can finish close games.
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
With Joe T. Robinson and Searcy both entering conference play ranked in the top six of Class 5A according to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Pine Bluff can’t afford too many slip-ups in 5A-Central Conference play if the Zebras intend to return to the playoffs after missing them last season.
This week’s game against Jacksonville (2-1) and the upcoming road games at Maumelle and Beebe therefore become critical games. The Zebras need to aim to win at least two of these first three conference games, if not all three, to put themselves in a good position before the next home game against Searcy.
The Titans finished last in the 5A-Central last season, their first in the conference since dropping down from Class 6A. They went 1-9 overall, 0-7 in league play.