How a small private school in far north Georgia has built a football power
Rabun Gap-Nacoochee had only three weeks together to prepare for the biggest game in program history.
The Eagles, who will visit defending 6A state champion Grayson on Friday, practiced together for the first time this season Aug. 1.
The boarding school based in Rabun County has a largely international student body with kids from over 50 countries. Many of its students — including its football players — leave the country to visit home in the summer.
Coach Derek White said the team still works out during the summer, but he acknowledged the challenge of preparing the Eagles to play teams who have been practicing together since May.
“The kids have never practiced together to implement scheme and everything,” White said. “We do get all day with them and do life, but that’s pretty quick when you play the people we play.”
Rabun Gap football isn’t a Georgia High School Association program, partially because international athletes would be ineligible for one year by GHSA regulations. The Eagles compete in the North Carolina Independent Schools Athletic Association and schedule teams from all over the Southeast. The school is 3 miles from the Georgia-North Carolina state line.
White dubbed the boarding school one of the best kept secrets in the country because of its athletics, education, international makeup and 1,400-acre campus nestled in the mountains. Despite the notable differences, White feels that Rabun Gap football is overlooked on a statewide and national scale.
But the Eagles were definitely less of a secret after beating state-powerhouse Benedictine 41-17 in the Erk Russell Classic last season.
“I don’t know how much they respected us, and that’s OK. I mean, why would you?” White said. “And we would love to play that game again. But it became a — we weren’t invited to the Erk Russell Classic anymore.
“It wasn’t a thing anymore, if you know what I mean.”
The football program is relatively young, entering its 15th varsity season. The program’s athletic director, Dale Earnhardt, was the first varsity football coach before Sean Bryson took over in 2017.
According to White, Bryson started building the team with more international players. Rabun Gap’s third coach, Joe Sturdivant, took the overseas influence to another level with a roster that was 90% international.
White has enjoyed the success of international players, too — six Division I football signees last season were from other countries — but he’s also reestablished more domestic influence to his roster.
“You never know what’s going to happen overseas, so I think we want our football team to look like our school, if that makes sense,” White said. “We have a mission of our school that we want to do, and we want the international 51 countries.
“But let’s be honest, we all know this, too. Domestic kids born and raised in the U.S. are probably the best football players.”
At first glance, building a culture of brotherhood with players from all over the world seems difficult. Football coaches on all levels talk about the challenge of building a team-minded culture with new players.
It’s why some NFL teams focus on re-signing players and some college teams recruit transfers only when necessary.
But White said building a culture of togetherness isn’t a problem at Rabun Gap. He said the boarding-school lifestyle makes a football team feel more like a family.
“Our kids live together, our kids sleep together, they eat lunch together, they eat breakfast together, they eat dinner together, they go to football practice, they go to study hall together,” White said. “Like, they don’t get away from each other. They actually do life together.”
White, whose family also lives on campus, spends more time with his players than he ever did coaching at traditional high schools.
“We deal with homesickness, death, divorce, good things, bad things, girlfriend problems,” White said. “A lot of coaches, they smack their kids on the butt and send them home and say, ‘I’ll see you.’
“We can’t do that. We get the good, the bad and the ugly. I mean, we all have dorm duty.”
Perhaps White’s biggest challenge — aside from three weeks of practice to prepare for Grayson — is getting teams on his schedule. The aftermath of the Benedictine win was not the first time he’s had trouble finding opponents.
In fact, that’s how the Grayson game came to be.
White said five different teams from Florida, Kentucky, Georgia and South Carolina canceled on him for Week One. When he found out the defending champions were available, he contacted Grayson athletic director Brian DeBerry.
“(DeBerry) said, ‘You’ll play us?’ and I said, ‘Yeah, man, I’ll play you,’” White said. “I said, ‘I’m not too keen or happy about it. I know how good y’all are, but you know what? I’ll do it.’
“And I was thinking in my head, ‘16 practices to get ready for them,’ because I’d already heard that they were going to be better than they were the year before, and I knew they won the state championship.”
White knows Grayson is the toughest opponent Rabun Gap has ever faced. He knows they’re coming off a 51-3 win over Class 6A’s preseason No. 5 team, Collins Hill.
He wants to use the Grayson game as a “measuring stick” for his players and program. He keeps the perspective on his team’s potential as it spends more time together throughout the season.
But he also repeats his team mantra: “Built for ships.” It’s about being uncommon in the little things for four different kinds of “ships.”
“The four ships are relationships, leadership, championships and scholarships,” White said. “We play for that. We play for everybody to know that we’re different.”
About the Author
Jack Leo is a sports writer and reporter for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Jack worked for the AJC throughout his four years studying journalism and sports media at Georgia State University and the University of Georgia. He's now focused on telling stories in the grassroots: bringing comprehensive coverage of high school sports for AJC Varsity.
