Buford, the defending Class 6A champion and current No. 1-ranked team, had its 16-game winning streak broken with a 7-0 loss to Chaminade-Madonna Prep of Hollywood, Fla., on Friday in the fifth week of the high school football season.
Chaminade-Madonna, which won three Florida state titles in the past four seasons and is the No. 1-ranked team in Class 3A this year, got 197 yards rushing and the game’s only touchdown from Davion Gause, the top-rated sophomore running back nationally.
The shutout loss was the first for Buford (3-1) since a 10-0 loss to a Trevor Lawrence-led Cartersville team in the 2015 Class 4A championship game, a span of 73 games.
Buford will begin play in Region 8 next weekend when it travels to Central Gwinnett.
“We’ve still got a long way to go,” Buford coach Bryant Appling told Stan Awtrey for the AJC. “But we have grown over the first four games. That’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to fight to get better and that’s what we’re going to try to do next week.”
Elsewhere, league play began in Region 5 and 7, and both featured upsets right out of the gate.
South Paulding pulled off the biggest upset of the week in Class 6A, beating eighth-ranked Rome 34-32 in the teams’ Region 5 opener. South Paulding had been projected as 28-point underdog by the computer Maxwell Ratings. The victory avenged a 22-20 loss to the Wolves in 2020, when South Paulding finished in fifth place and narrowly missed out on a playoff berth. Rome was the region runner-up last year.
Other winners in Region 5 were defending champion Carrollton (56-15 over Dalton), Douglas County (44-10 over East Paulding) and Alexander (28-13 over Paulding County). All three teams are undefeated for the season.
The Region 7 upset came from Cambridge, which is 3-0 for the first time since 2014 after a 7-0 victory over Creekview. Maxwell had projected Creekview as a 19-point favorite, and the computer had tabbed the Grizzlies as the preseason favorite to win the region.
Creekview beat Cambridge 19-0 last year and went on to finish second in the region, one spot ahead of Cambridge, which won a first-round playoff game against Kell before losing in the second round to Buford.
Other Region 7 winners included defending champion River Ridge (33-7 over Chattahoochee), Riverwood (32-10 over Centennial) and Johns Creek (41-20 over Sequoyah). River Ridge and Riverwood are 4-0 overall, and Johns Creek is 3-1.
League play begins in Regions 2 and 8 next weekend.
In Region 6, Kennesaw Mountain and Pope remained tied for first place and improved to 3-0 in region play with victories Friday night. Kennesaw Mountain defeated Kell 17-7, and Pope beat South Cobb 41-20. The win was particularly significant for Kennesaw Mountain, which made the playoffs last year for the first time in school history, as it was the Mustangs’ third consecutive victory over a 2020 playoff team from the region. Pope has defeated Kell, the runner-up last year, but still must face Sprayberry and defending region champion Allatoona. Pope will travel to Kennesaw Mountain on Oct. 15.
About the Author
