HIGH SCHOOL FOOTBALL / STORYLINES TO WATCH
Georgia high school football returns tonight with the first two of nearly 200 season openers.
Games between top-10 teams include Hughes at Carrollton, Grayson vs. Walton, Kell at Parkview, Marist at Gainesville, Warner Robins at Lee County, Jones County at Northside-Warner Robins, ELCA at Bainbridge and Fitzgerald at Irwin County.
The largest event is the Corky Kell Classic, a slate of 11 metro Atlanta games culminating in a full day of football Saturday at Mercedes-Benz Stadium, where the GHSA will experiment with instant replay.
Here are 10 storylines to follow this year as the 2023 season dawns.
Week 0: There will be more games between top-10 teams and more surprises this week than any other this regular season. That’s because mandatory region schedules haven’t begun, and top teams are increasingly unafraid to play each other. This also is the most unpredictable time of the year. Twenty-three of the 80 top-10 teams lost first-week games last year. Only five lost in the final week of the regular season, so enjoy it while you can.
Who’ll come out on top? That’s the ultimate intrigue. In 2022, Thomson was the only unranked team from preseason to win a state title. The No. 1 teams in preseason historically win titles about 30% of the time. Three of last season’s No. 1 teams (Hughes, Benedictine, Prince Avenue Christian) came out on top. They’re starting No. 1 this year along with defending champions Ware County and Bowdon. Also No. 1 are Buford, Cedar Grove and Fitzgerald, teams that started No. 1 last year but fell short.
Coaching them up: Of the GHSA’s 413 teams, 102 have new head coaches. The most compelling probably are Adam Carter, who won a 2020 title at Grayson but left for Lowndes, which fired its last coach, and Marquis Westbrook, who won two state titles at Warner Robins but took a job at a smaller school, Peach County, a Class 3A contender. Also interesting is Joe Sturdivant, a player on Parkview’s 45-0 run from 2000-02 who is back at his alma mater with a top-10 preseason team.
It is what it is: As a University of Georgia pledge and the nation’s consensus No. 1 recruit, Dylan Raiola will transcend Georgia high school football this season. If it’s any indication, he has 26,100 followers on X, formerly known as Twitter, and 33,400 on Instagram. That Raiola transferred from an Arizona school and wound up at Buford only adds to the intrigue. Raiola will be one of three five-star recruits, joining Eddrick Houston and K.J. Bolden, suiting up for the Wolves, who are ranked in the top 10 of virtually every national poll.
Big-time city schools: Buford is one, and so are Carrollton of 7A and Gainesville of 6A. Those well-financed programs hired big-name coaches (Carrollton’s Joey King, Gainesville’s Josh Niblett) to take them to another level, and it’s working. Both could arrive in the promised land this season after their unranked teams in 2022 made surprising runs to the finals. Both start No. 2 this preseason.
Made to be broken: Trevor Lawrence’s state record of 13,902 passing yards is certain to fall. It’s just a question of when. Prince Avenue Christian’s Aaron Philo has thrown for 9,326 yards, and another season like his past two will threaten Lawrence. Carrollton’s Ju Ju Lewis passed for 4,118 yards as a freshman last season, so the math isn’t in Lawrence’s long-term favor. Quarterbacks will be the state’s marquee position this season, with Hughes’ Air Noland (Ohio State), Calvary Day’s Jake Merklinger (Tennessee) and Benedictine’s Luke Kromenhoek (Florida State) all among the consensus top 10 at their position nationally.
National implications: Georgia’s place in the country will be determined in part based on how its teams do in interstate games. On Friday, No. 3 St. Frances Academy of Maryland will play at No. 7 Buford (using High School Football America rankings). On Saturday, No. 11 Dutch Fork of South Carolina will play at No. 18 Colquitt County. Also fun this week will be Valdosta’s trip to Massillon in Ohio. Valdosta ranks No. 1 and Massillon No. 4 all-time in victories. Then Creekside, Georgia’s No. 2 Class 5A team, has the audacity to travel to the nation’s consensus No. 1 team, California’s Mater Dei, on Sept. 2. Georgia was 74-32 against out-of-state teams last year.
Can we have another look? The GHSA will be using instant replay for the first time this season, but only for the eight championship games in December and a trial run Saturday. The four Corky Kell Dave Hunter Classic games this weekend at Mercedes-Benz Stadium will serve as practice. Georgia remains one of only about 20 states nationwide to implement any kind of video review.
Class assignments: The GHSA will begin reclassifying its more than 450 members schools this fall. There will be seven classes next season instead of eight (or six instead of seven, depending on the definition of Class A). That’s one fewer than now, and it means no more Class 7A. This won’t affect the current football season, but where schools fall in class and region often causes more joy and pain than football Friday nights.
Where it all ends: The eight championship games are returning to Mercedes-Benz Stadium on Dec. 11-13 after four seasons at Georgia State’s open-air Center Parc Stadium. They will be played on weekdays (Monday-Wednesday). The GHSA hopes for better attendance, which averaged 27,443 at Center Parc but topped 40,000 in their last visit to the Benz.
Credit: Jason Getz
Credit: Jason Getz
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