Round 1 one of the games matching the top four teams in Region 2-AAAAA went according to form, or at least according to the rankings.
No. 1 Northside-Warner Robins avenged the only loss from its 2014 state championship season with a 36-22 victory over Jones County on Thursday night at McConnell-Talbert Stadium in Warner Robins. The following night at the same site, second-ranked Houston County rolled to 34-14 victory over unranked but previously unbeaten Warner Robins.
Northside and Houston County are both 4-0 overall and tied for first place in the region at 3-0. Northside has won 12 region titles in the past 17 years.
Jones County and Warner Robins (both 3-1, 2-1) fell into a third-place tie with Grovetown and Lakeside-Evans.
Round 2 will come on Oct. 16, when Northside and Warner Robins meet at McConnell-Talbert and Houston County travels to Jones County.
Here are some of the other big stories in Class AAAAA from Week 5:
- The Effingham County schools are making some noise in Region 3. South Effingham improved to 4-0 (2-0 in the region) for the first time since 2008 with a 35-21 victory over Statesboro and is tied for first place with sixth-ranked Ware County. Effingham County is 3-1 after beating Brunswick 30-20 and is tied for third place in the region at 1-1 with Coffee, Glynn Academy and Richmond Hill.
- Defending Region 5 champion Allatoona is back in the thick of the title race after its 25-18 victory over previously unbeaten South Paulding. Allatoona has won four consecutive games since a 17-10 loss to East Paulding in its opener. After taking next week off, Allatoona’s next two games will be against Alexander and New Manchester, the only remaining unbeaten teams in the region.
- Stephenson routed Creekside 49-12 in a Region 6 crossover game to avenge two losses to the Seminoles last season. Creekside beat the Jaguars in the regular season (28-14) and the region championship game (34-27) in 2014. Stephenson’s only loss this year came against American Heritage (Fla.), which is No. 10 nationally in USA Today’s rankings.
- Region 7 favorite Kell survived a tough challenge from Forsyth Central in its subregion opener for the second consecutive season but escaped with a 14-13 victory. Forsyth Central cut the lead to one point with 39 seconds remaining, but Kell intercepted a pass on the Bulldogs’ two-point conversion attempt to preserve the win.
- Loganville improved to 4-0 for the first time since 1998 with a 27-20 victory over Winder-Barrow to set up a showdown next week with defending Region 8 champion Lanier. Rhett Mixon had two long interception returns for touchdowns for the Red Devils. Loganville, Lanier, Salem and Gainesville all remain undefeated in region play.
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