Minor league football: Warriors, Devil Dawgs moving out of local area

Published 10:10 pm Tuesday, January 25, 2011

If you’re looking to take care of your football fever by watching local minor league teams this summer, you’ll have to drive a little farther.

The Alabama Warriors and the Central Alabama Devil Dawgs are both moving from the facilities they used last season in Warrior and Corner, respectively.

The Warriors, owned by player-coach Lee Ellison, will move to Birmingham and play at Lawson Field, a city-owned stadium in the area near the old Eastwood Mall and Century Plaza, Ellison told the North Jefferson News.

The move was necessary after the Jefferson County Board of Education told the team it could no longer use the old Warrior High School field, which had been its home and that of the club’s predecessor, the Warrior Wildfire.

The Warriors had used the field for two seasons, but had to play nearly all its games in the afternoon because a light standard was damaged by fire during a game, and never repaired.

Meanwhile the Devil Dawgs will move their operations to the former West Jefferson High School field. That move was unanimously approved by the West Jefferson town council last week.

The Devil Dawgs, which were operated by Jesse Reed (who was also a player), played their inaugural season at what is now the Corner Middle School field. Reed said the school told them they could no longer use the field after Corner High moved to its new facility last August.

Both teams played last season in the Premier South Football League, with the Devil Dawgs advancing as far as the playoff semifinals.

The Devil Dawgs split off from the Warriors at the start of the previous PSFL season.

Both teams fared well on the field, but struggled to attract a fan base, partly due to their proximity to each other’s home field and inconvenient access to the metro Birmingham population base.

Reed had explored possible locations in the south part of the metro area, but wanted to keep the team in the northern part if at all possible.