Brothers set to face off in Albany’s most significant football game in 30 years
Corey and Uyl Joyner talk multiple times every day. Uyl, the younger brother and head football coach at Dougherty, calls Corey, football coach at Westover, to chat about football, life, family, whatever’s on his mind.
They talk every day. Except this week.
The brothers will coach against each other Friday when Dougherty hosts Westover. That’d be a big deal on its own — a rivalry game between two Albany programs that dates back to 1970 — but this year, a region championship will be on the line.
Both Dougherty and Westover are 7-1. If Dougherty wins, it will win Region 1-4A outright‚ and if the Patriots win, they’ll force a three-way tie with Cairo.
This is the biggest game between Albany schools since 1996, when Uyl Joyner was a sophomore quarterback and led Dougherty (8-1) to a 26-16 victory over Monroe (9-0) for a subregion championship. Since then, no Albany teams have played each other with records as good as 7-1 or with such obvious region-title implications.
Westover is the more recent region champion of the two, having won it in 2013. However, that is the program’s only region title. Dougherty has three, with the most recent being in 2005.
“It’s bigger than a lot of people think,” Corey Joyner said. “And then talking about seeding for the playoffs and all this other good stuff. So this is a real, real big game. Even if our name wasn’t Joyner, it’s a real big game.”
It’ll be the third meeting between the two brothers, who coached together at Carver of Columbus from 2019 to 2021. Corey Joyner was head coach at Carver from 2018-2021 and took the Tigers to a state final in 2021, where they lost to Benedictine.
Under Corey Joyner, Westover is 2-0 against the Trojans.
But this is Dougherty’s best squad under Joyner, who won a combined eight games in three seasons. Dougherty is considered a 9-point favorite in the game, according to the Maxwell Ratings.
“This goes back to high school, man,” said Uyl Joyner, who led Dougherty to a state title in 1998. “This was always my dream job. I always said that I wanted to be the head coach at Dougherty High. I don’t know why. I can’t even tell you why. But it was just something that I saw in my coaches — my basketball coach, Charlie Givens, my football coach, John Reynolds. The way those guys helped mold men out of boys. I think the biggest growth for a young man is from 14 to 18. So to be in that kid’s life from 14 and watch them grow to an 18-year-old, there’s nothing better than that.”
The family affair goes beyond the coaches.
Dougherty’s quarterback is Uyl Joyner’s son, Micah, who has thrown for 1,703 yards and 24 touchdowns as a sophomore. Westover’s offensive coordinator is Corey Joyner’s oldest son, Jaylen, and his younger son, Jordan, plays wide receiver, tallying 20 catches for 191 yards and a touchdown.
Their brother is flying in from Maryland and they have family coming up from Jacksonville, Florida. While there will be Joyners on both sides of the field Friday, most of them will be repping Dougherty.
“Unfortunately, my mom passed in December, but she was going to root for him no matter what because that’s the baby of the family,” Corey Joyner said. “My whole family went to Dougherty and graduated from Dougherty, so they’re going to be sitting on Dougherty’s side.”
Uyl Joyner agreed with his brother’s prediction as far as the family’s rooting interest goes.
“We split our family in half,” he said. “When my mom was living, my mom let it be known she was like ‘Ah nah, I’m rooting for Dougherty. I’m with Dougherty. I’ve been with Dougherty for many years. I ain’t telling him to go over there to wear stuff he should have never went.’”
Corey Joyner has a sense of what to expect from the Trojans on Friday. He has more than a decade of studying plays with him and understanding what Uyl Joyner is looking for.
Westover beat Dougherty 35-0 in 2024 and 40-20 last season.
“The first year we played, he didn’t change his signals,” Corey Joyner said, laughing. “I was calling out all his plays. He was like, ‘Hey man, what are you doing?’ I said, ‘Hey, that’s you. You gotta change your signals, man. You didn’t change your signals. I’ll call your plays out.’
“So that was the first year. So next year he did wristbands. So I don’t know what he’s gonna do.”
Dougherty and Westover will close out their regular seasons Nov. 6 against Hardaway and Spencer, respectively. Dougherty is projected by Maxwell to earn a No. 6 seed in the playoffs, while Westover is a projected No. 15 seed.
Dougherty will be looking for its first playoff win since 2022. Westover has not won in the postseason since 2013.
“Everybody that’s in Albany, everybody that’s from Albany, they love their high school,” Uyl Joyner said. “So to be on the east side of Albany, go in the store and you hear about ‘Hey, man, y’all doing a great job over there doing it.’ And then you go to the south side and you see somebody from Monroe, or Dougherty. It’s just a good place to be. Then to be able to coach my son and coach some of my friends’ sons, it’s just great.”