TUNNEL HILL, Ga. — In a matchup of teams heading in opposite directions, it was Northwest Whitfield who took care of business Friday night with a 46-14 victory at home against Stone Mountain High School.

Stone Mountain was overmatched from the opening possession as it only took two plays for the Bruins to take the lead. Running back Brady Hughes took a handoff 56 yards down the home sideline and with the extra point by Rene Salmeron the Bruins led 7-0.

Stone Mountain went three plays and out on its opening possession and it was downhill from that point on in the first quarter. Northwest held Stone Mountain to minus 26 yards of total offense in the first quarter and racked up two safeties and an interception for a touchdown while also scoring touchdowns on three of its first four possessions. Northwest led 39-0 at the end of the first quarter.

“I’m proud of our defensive effort tonight,” Northwest head coach Josh Robinson said. “Scoring points and getting turnovers on defense is a big deal. Our tackling has to be better, and I know we were the better team tonight but we have to continue to grow as a football team.”

The score ballooned to 46-0 at the half, and Northwest played its backups for the entirety of the second half with a running clock. In the first half, however, the Northwest offense was sharp. Quarterback Ty Fisher finished the game 12-18 passing for 150 yards with two touchdowns and continued his connection with receiver Jaret Staten who finished the first half with four receptions for 62 yards and one touchdown. Fisher and Staten seemed to find their rhythm in the second half of last week’s loss to Dalton and that continued Friday night as Staten had receptions of 15, 32 and 12 yards to go along with a three-yard touchdown reception.

“I can tell from practice and from being around each other more that we’ve definitely got each other down based on rhythm and timing,” Staten said. “I’m learning how he throws and he’s learning how I run my routes. We feel a lot better than we did last week.”

Fisher spread the ball around as well, completing passes to five receivers, including a five-yard screen pass to Hughes for a touchdown to make the score 31-0. Staten intercepted Stone Mountain quarterback Shahiem Bailey on the next play and returned the ball 25 yards for a touchdown on the second to last play of the first quarter.

Running back Dominique Sistrunk, who played the game with a cast on his left hand, looked no worse for the wear and carried the ball five times for 40 yards and two touchdowns. Sistrunk was used sparingly in the first half and was on the sidelines with his pads off at the start of the second half.

When both teams’ starters were on the field, the Northwest defense suffocated the Stone Mountain attack, holding the Pirates to 81 total yards of offense in the first half and forcing three turnovers to go along with the two safeties. Stone Mountain scored on its opening possession of the second half and once more toward the end of the fourth quarter.

“Any win feels good, but after a loss from our rival it feels good to go out there and play how we played,” Fisher said. “I like getting out of the game when we’re able to score a lot of points and hopefully we can run up some scores like that against as many people as we can.”