GHSF Daily's Four Questions feature historically poses the same questions to a different Georgia head coach each issue. This season, head coaches are being asked Four Questions tailored to current events. Today's interviewee is Pickens head coach Chris Parker, whose team defeated 10th-ranked Ridgeland 31-21 on Friday to clinch Region 6-AAAA. That marks Pickens' first region championship in 62 seasons of varsity football.
Chris Parker, Pickens head coach
1. Why was the Ridgeland victory big for your team? "It gives us our first region championship and first nine-win season in school history. We have a lot of people that help our program that have been around Pickens County for a long time and have supported this team through ups and downs. To see how excited they were makes it really special. I know how hard all of our players and coaches have worked, and it is an awesome feeling to see that hard work pay off on the field with something they can always remember. We have been competitive the past seven years but have not been able to get over that hump. Winning it at home, on senior night, against such a good Ridgeland team was something I will always remember."
2. What put this team over the top? "We have a lot of players on this team that have played a lot. We played young players in 2016 and 2017, and those guys are now seniors and juniors. These seniors and juniors are also the first guys to go all the way through our middle school program. They were fifth- and sixth-graders when we got to Pickens [in 2012]. We work very closely with our sub-varsity programs, and I really think the building from that level up has really shown this year. We have also been very fortunate with injuries, and our players have just done a tremendous job of doing whatever we ask of them.
"It really is a special group of young men. We had two teammates pass away in 2017. These young men on our team have really bonded and been through a lot of ups and downs over their football careers. Seeing how our community has come together has been awesome. It is such a great feeling to know that they have been the team to make history for our school and our community." [Former Pickens players Jordan Simonds and Shawn Mask died months apart in 2017 of injuries sustained in separate automobile-related accidents.]
3. Your record is 46-27 at Pickens, a program that was 10-40 in the five seasons before you arrived. Your record was 26-17 at Chapel Hill, a program that was 12-38 in the five seasons prior. What's the secret to reversing the fortunes of struggling programs? "This a great question. I'm now in my 11th year as a head coach, and I am more proud of being able to make Chapel Hill and Pickens both relevant and competitive during every year I have coached as any other on-field accomplishment.
"The key is to focus on what you do have and not on what you don't have. There are a million reasons why teams struggle, and in my experience most people focus on those reasons and don't accentuate the good things the school has and focus on them. When you do that, the administration is more supportive and the players buy in. At Pickens, we had one high school in the county and a great group of people that supported the program. We built from there and got involved in middle school football and started growing. I think everyone should remember that every place is different, and you need to assess what is good about your place and work to accentuate that. As with anything in life, being organized, flexible and hard-working goes a long way as well.
"We have also been very fortunate to have had good players, hired good assistant coaches and had great support. The reason those things always come up in answers like this is because they are true. It truly takes a bunch of people to make the football program successful."
4. What's a quick scouting report on your team and its potential beyond the region? "Offensively, we are very good on the offensive line, we have a quarterback that can really run or throw it to go with the most accomplished receiver in school history and a stable of about six running backs who are all very good. All of our running backs play defense, and they are all guys who can take over the game. This gives us the ability to adjust week to week, and we can throw the ball all game, run it all game, run inside, outside, etc. We are very versatile. We line up in hundreds of formations and really try to make you defend the entire field. The offensive line really makes it go. We have only allowed one sack and are averaging about 8 yards per rush. This makes it easy to call plays. On defense, we have an experienced group that is able to adjust to all the different things that you see nowadays. We have senior linebackers who have been around for a while and a very talented perimeter group that all play running back on offense. Mix that in with the best freshman kicker I have ever seen and we really have been fortunate to have all the pieces come together in these first nine games. It's my goal to work to keep it going as long as possible. Obviously since the school has never won a playoff game it would be foolish to predict anything beyond getting the first one, but we are going to work every week we are allowed to play to try to get 'one more week!' These boys have been so fun to work with, we want it to go on as long as it can."
Produced by Georgia High School Football Daily, a free e-mail newsletter. To join the mailing list, click here.
About the Author
