RESERVE — The East St. John Wildcats (1-7) celebrated their first victory of the season Friday with a 47-37 win over the Terrebonne High School Tigers (2-6).

Both District 7-5A teams entered the game having not won a district game.

The Wildcats didn’t act like a losing team during their first two drives of the night.

Quarterback Marquise Darensbourg ran for 53 yards, passed for 12 yards and made a 34-yard rushing touchdown to bring the score to 7-0 after the extra point.

After a Terrebonne turnover on downs, ESJ went 67 yards in three plays for another score.

Darensbourg threw to Arlandrian Martin for a 55-yard receiving touchdown. Darensbourg threw from the 12-yard line to CJ Turner on their next play, for another touchdown.

“We took off in the second quarter,” East St. John head football coach Alden Foster said. “We scored on the first play.”

Later in the game, From the line of scrimmage, Reginald Foster grabbed the ball and ran 83 yards for a touchdown bring the score to 20-0.

ESJ followed that with a Darensbourg to Damonte Coxie hand-off that led to another touchdown and a 27-0 lead.

“Terrebonne fumbled on their next possession,” Foster said. “Darensbourg ran the ball from the five and scored again.”

That brought the tally to 33-0.

Darensbourg wasn’t finished. One touchdown pass to Falton Holifield and a 50-yard touchdown run and Darensbourg was involved in most of ESJ’s offense.

Terrebonne picked up momentum in the second half with defense, but its offense couldn’t catch up.

“It feels great to finally win,” Foster said. “We did the work and it paid off.

“We changed the lineup. We came out and had a good drive going. We were doing really good and scored our first almost 40-yard running touchdown. After that, we got the ball back and scored again.”

— By Courtney Griggs