VOLUME 11 ISSUE 42 | DECEMBER 10-16, 2015 | YOUR SOURCE FOR SPORTS IN GEORGIA

Time to look great!

RUN THE WORLDPerfect seasons are put to the test as Colquitt County and Roswell clash for 6A’s crown. | Pg. 7

Save The Day | Pg. 4

Kyle Sandy highlights the biggest storylines from Tuesday’s hoops action.

Never Say Never | Pg. 9

Allatoona looks to become the first Cobb County public school to take home a state title Friday night.

STAND TALL. STAND PROUD. STAND ARMY STRONG.

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recruiter, goarmy.com or call 1-800-USA-ARMY.

Earn a salary and money for your education while you gain the strength to standout. Visit your local Army Career Counselor today or visit us online atgoarmy.com/bs02

3Vol. 11 Iss. 41 | December 3-9, 2015

PUBLISHER/EDITOR I.J. Rosenberg

ART/CREATIVE DIRECTOR DJ Galbiati Blalock

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ASST. MANAGING EDITOR Kyle Sandy

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BEAT WRITERS: Ricky Dimon (Braves) Colin Hubbard (GA Tech) Dan Mathews (UGA) Craig Sager II (Falcons, Kennesaw) Kyle Sandy (Transfer Corner, GSU, Hawks) STAFF WRITERS Tyler Andrews

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STARTING LINEUP 04 COLUMNISTS 07 09ON THE COVER PREP COVER

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It was pretty much domination from the begin-ning for the Alabama Crimson Tide over the

Florida Gators in this year’s edition of the SEC Championship Game. 29-15 is the final, but the final score doesn’t tell the whole story. The Gators were only able to run for 15 total yards on 21 attempts, Saturday inside the Georgia Dome. The time of possession wasn’t even close, with Alabama controlling the foot-ball for about 44 minutes, as compared to the Gators 16:31. The Florida points came from an 85 yard punt return touchdown by Antonio Callaway and a fourth quarter touchdown pass from quarterback Treon Harris to CJ Worton. Again, Alabama completely dominated the Gators. Senior center Ryan Kelly says it is

because of the team first mindset they have. “It’s just all of us doing our job,” Kelly said. “When the offensive line needs do it the most, we step up to the occasion. defense did a hell of a job tonight and you’ve got (running back) Derrick Henry back there toting the rock. It’s awesome. In any aspect, it shouldn’t matter what defense they run. As long as we do our job, we’re going to be fine. I cannot say enough about this team.” Florida’s defense did play Alabama tough in this game. The Crimson Tide were held to 166 rushing yards and 180 passing. They were averaging over 200 yards per game.

HEISMAN HOPEFUL Heisman Trophy front runner Derrick

Henry had to grind out his 135 yards on the ground, with 32 carries. He had high praise for the Gator defense. “I think it’s the best defense that we faced,” Henry said. “They’re very physical, very disrup-tive, very fast on the defensive line. Athletic line-backers who are very physical and try to knock you out and good secondary. So I think it’s the best defense that we’ve faced all year.” For the second straight year, the Crimson Tide have won the conference with a first year starting quarterback. Jacob Coker is the man this year, after getting beat out for the job by then senior Blake Simms. After the game, Coker shared a moment with his parents/family. When he was asked about it the past year and what that moment with the family meant, he got emotional. “I was over there with my mom and par-ents (voice crackling),” Coker said “They’ve done so much for me growing up. I just want to raise my kids, like they raised me. They did ev-erything they could to make my life what it is. When I was going through stuff, they were go-ing through stuff. My parents and family have been awesome.” As is usually the case with Alabama af-ter games like this, they try to keep the mo-ment from getting too big. Some players even through out the “just another game” talk when

describing the SEC Championship win, be-cause they’re focused on completing the task of winning a national title. It has been three years, sine the Crimson Tide won their last title. Senior cornerback Cyrus Jones was on that team in 2012 that beat Notre Dame. He admits that it is tough to say the SEC Championship is just another game. But, there’s still work to be done for this program. “Around here you get jobs for winning national championships,” Jones said. “SEC Championship is great, our goal is not com-plete. We haven’t reached it yet. We won the SEC Championship last year, but I’m sure we won’t forget that feeling walking off the Super-dome Field. If we win the SEC Championship this year and then go out in the first round of the playoffs this year again. What does it re-ally mean? Nothing. We did the same thing we did last year. We’re still going to go back to the drawing board, go back to practice, stay hun-gry and just try to complete our mission.” We now know that Alabama is in the Col-lege Football Playoff and very likely the Okla-homa Sooners will be there as well. We will find out the entire field on Sunday at noon eastern. Photo courtesy of Rob Saye.

DAN’S DOCKETT

BY DAN MATHEWS | DMATHEWS@SCOREATL.COM

ALABAMA TAKES SEC TITLE AND LOOKS FOR MORE

As high school basketball heats up during the cold winter months, here are some

previews of some of the top games taking place this Tuesday night. Top ten matchups will shake the polls up while teams try to find their place in the pecking order of the state’s best.

NO. 4 NORCROSS (4-1) AT NO. 6 COLLINS HILL (4-0) The power struggle atop Region 7-AAAAAA officially begins as two early fa-vorites to win the crown do battle. The Eagles nipped Norcross in their first meeting early last year 70-68 before the Blue Devils went on a rampage and finished 13-1 in the region. Size has always been a crucial advantage for Nor-cross with 6-foot-8 towers Rayshaun Ham-monds and Lance Thomas, who can score

inside and out. But this year, the Eagles have added some imposing size of their own down low. AJ Cheeseman is a 6-foot-6 power for-ward that has signed to play at New Orleans. Chris Parks is only a sophomore, but he is a big active body at 6-foot-5 and can mix it up with the longer Blue Devils. Kai Lambert, JD Ozoh and TeShaun Hightower must be X-factors and hit open shots for Collins Hill if they want to slow down Norcross, who features strong guard play of their own in Kyle Sturdivant, Jor-dan Goldwire and Chris Curlett.

NO. 2 GAINESVILLE (3-0) AT NO. 5 CEDAR SHOALS (7-0) Region 8-AAAAA has quietly blossomed into one of the best regions in the entire state

behind Gainesville, Cedar Shoals and No. 6 Heritage, not to mention the always ready to take over a game, Butler signee Kamar Baldwin of Apalachee. This matchup will be the Jaguars first major test of the season. Gainesville has defeated 2A No. 2 St. Francis (without Kobi Simmons) 70-58 at the Jared Cook Classic and rallied from down 11 at the half to knock off Heritage, 85-79 last week. Georgia State signee D’Marcus Simonds poured in 26 points in the comeback while Bailey Minor added 20. The Red Elephants have plenty of pieces and can beat teams in a variety of ways. KJ Buffen is a blossoming star forward, Tae Turner is a Lakeview Academy transfer and Messiah Dorsey and Xavier Bledson have both hit big shots over their career. Phlan Fleming is usually the focal point of the offense for Cedar Shoals from his wing position, but Snipe Hall, Jerrick Mitchell and big man Stavion Stevenson have brought the Jags to the next level with their balanced play.

NO. 5 GAC (4-3) AT NO. 2 PACE ACADEMY (0-2) Don’t let the record fool you. Pace may be winless but they have held on tight to their No. 2 ranking for good reason. A 7-point loss to 6A No. 1 Westlake and a 56-44 loss this past weekend at Adidas Xplosion to 1A No. 1 Green-

forest are as good of losses as you can get. Class of 2017 No. 1 overall player according to many pundits, Wendell Carter Jr., is a beast in-side at 6-foot-10. He can handle the ball, shoot from the outside, protect the paint and may be the state’s best rebounder. Shooters Zack Kaminsky and Caleb Holifield are lethal from the outside while Isaiah Kelly brings an active 6-foot-8 body inside to pair with Carter. GAC is working its way back to full strength. Lead-ing scorer Brian Coffey Jr. will try to give it a go at point guard after injuring his knee last week. Garrett Covington can do everything with the basketball and causes matchup problems from his off-guard position. Jacob Hoffman came down with an ankle injury in a 75-67 overtime win over rival No. 6 Holy Innocents, but when healthy, he is one of the best shooters in the state. Freshman guard Hunter McIntosh is tough to rattle as shown when he poured in 27 points in Coffey’s absence. Charlie O’Briant stands 6-foot-8 and will be a game-time deci-sion after a severe laceration to his lip. He and big man Chris Hinton, 6-foot-5, 240 pounds, will need to put a body on Carter the entire game and try to push him outside like Green-forest did successfully. Photo courtesy of Ty Freeman.

SANDY’S SPIEL

BY KYLE SANDY | KSANDY@SCOREATL.COM

TUESDAY BASKETBALL PREVIEWS

CLICK BELOW TO SEE THE OFFICIAL GHSA FOOTBALL STATE CHAMPIONSHIPS GUIDE!

6 SCORE ATLANTA | www.ScoreAtl.com

OUR TWO CENTSOur email newsletter is something we take a lot of pride in at Score. If you aren’t familiar with it, it is a high school sports-heavy publication that we produce each day to fill in our readers on the latest happenings in Georgia prep sports. We send it out Monday through Friday throughout the year and Monday through Saturday during the fall.

Not only do we cover popular sports like football, basketball and baseball, we also cover every other varsity sport the GHSA fields. If you like Georgia high school sports at all, sign up for our email newsletter by visiting www.tinyurl.com/scorenewsletter and enter your email address(es) that you’d like added to the distribution list.

WH

O’S

HOT

WH

O’S

NOT

Kristaps Porzingis

NFC EastColquitt County Tom CoughlinArizona Cardinals NFL Kickers

The 7’3 forward has been ev-erything the Knicks hoped he would be when they drafted him 4th overall in the 2015 NBA draft. The rookie is averag-ing 14.6 points per game and hauling in 8.9 rebounds per contest. Porzingis has made plays all over the court mak-ing highlight reel dunks and blocks and shooting nearly 40% from 3-point range. Porz-ingis has the Knicks flirting with a .500 record.

The Redskins, Eagles, and Giants are all tied for the divi-sion lead with records of 5-7 while the last place Cowboys are just one game behind with a 4-8 record of their own. The Redskins had a chance to move to .500 and take com-mand of the division Monday night but fell to the Cowboys who stayed alive with the win. One of these teams will not only make the playoffs, but also host a Wild Card game.

The undefeated Packers en-ters Saturday’s Class AAAAAA State Championship game red hot riding a 29-game win streak. After dismantling one of the top defenses in the state in Mill Creek by putting up 52 points they will need to get by a talented Roswell team who is boasting an undefeated record of their own into the game.

The Giants are now 5-7 after blowing a 10-point lead in the fourth quarter against the Jets. Coughlin had a chance to make it a 13-point game but opted to go for it on fourth down with ten min-utes to go in the final quarter. That mistake would turn out to be cost-ly as Brandon Marshall caught a touchdown pass to tie the game at 20-20 with 30 seconds left and Randy Bullock would hit a field goal in overtime to give the Jets the lead and possibly open the door for Coughlin after the season.

Since dropping two out of three games in October the Cardinals have ripped off six straight wins and in impres-sive fashion. The Cardinals now sit at 10-2 and bolster the top scoring offense in the NFL at 31.8 points per game while averaging just under 300 passing yards per game. The defense has done its part as well giving up just 19.3 points per game, good enough for 4th in the league.

On Sunday NFL kickers missed more extra points in one day than they did all of the 2014 season. Although the extra point has been moved back 15 yards, it is still rare to see nine extra points missed across the league in one day. The biggest culprit of the weekend was Jaguars kicker Jason Myers who missed two in the game and has now missed six extra points on the season.

SCORE LISTBy Ned Kaish

NUMBERSBy Ned Kaish

UGA PITTED AGAINST PENN STATEThe Georgia Bulldogs will play Penn State on January 2nd at the TaxSlayer Bowl in Jacksonville, Florida. Wide receivers coach Bryan McClendon, who took over as interim head coach after Richt took the Miami job, will coach the Bulldogs who finished the season 9-3. This will be the 19th straight season Georgia has reached a bowl game, the third longest active streak. Penn State comes into the game with a 7-5 record.

On Tuesday the Braves made yet another trade for young talent, this time it included last year’s number one overall draft pick, Dansby Swanson. The Braves gave up pitcher Shelby Miller and a minor league pitcher to the Diamondbacks who in return sent Swanson, outfielder Ender Inciarte and pitcher Aaron Blair to Atlanta. Swanson, a Marietta native, led Vanderbilt to the College World Series in 2014 where he was named the Most Outstanding Player.

BRAVES TRADE FOR SWANSON

GA STATE SHOCKS GA SOUTHERNOn Saturday Georgia State not only upset there in state rival, but also became bowl eligible. The Panthers handled the Eagles with relative ease winning 34-7. Georgia State, who finished the season 6-6, will play San Jose State in the Cure Bowl. Georgia Southern who will play in their first bowl game is matched up against Bowling Green in the GoDaddy Bowl on December 23.

CFB PLAYOFF SETThe College Football Playoff is set, and without much drama this year. In the first game on New Years Eve, No. 1 Clemson coming off an ACC Championship will play No. 4 Oklahoma at 4pm in Miami. The second semifinal will match two conference championship game winners as SEC winner and No. 2 Alabama takes on Big 10 champ No. 4 Michigan State. The Crimson Tide and Spartans will square off in Arlington, Texas with kickoff set for 8pm.

HEISMAN FINALIST ANNOUNCEDThe three Heisman finalists who will attend the ceremony in New York have been announced. Alabama running back Derrick Henry has rushed for nearly 2,000 yards for the SEC Champion Crimson Tide. He will be joined by Clemson quarterback Deshaun Watson and Stanford running back Christian McCaffrey. Watson has already taken home ACC Player of the Year while McCaffrey is fresh off breaking Barry Sander’s record for all-purpose yards in a season.

? “

ANSWER ON PAGE 14- Julio Jones on Atlanta’s

red zone woes

TRIVIA QUESTION

SANITY AT LAST

HOW MANY PLAYOFF GAMES HAS COLQUITT COUNTY WON UNDER

RUSH PROPST?

“Our main focus is to score when we get in the red zone — not field goals. We just have to get better in

the red zone.”

By

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Ka

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13

18

4,160

3,496

5

2009

2

1,338

Interceptions thrown by Matt Ryan through 12 games.

Consecutive years Georgia Tech had made a bowl game before this season dating back to 1997.

Passing yards by Georgia State quarterback Nick Arbuckle (4,160) this season.

Receiving yards for Julio Jones who takes back over the NFL lead from Antonio Brown.

All-purpose yards from Stanford’s Heisman finalist Christian McCaffrey who broke Barry Sanders’ 27-year-old record.

Straight losses for the Falcons who have not won a game since October.

The last time a Gwinnett team failed to reach the state finals in Georgia’s highest classification.

Regular season rematches slated for championship weekend (3A, A-Public)

7Vol. 11 Iss. 41 | December 3-9, 2015

Championship weekend’s main event fea-tures the only undefeated matchup of this

year’s finals as Roswell faces the defending champion Colquitt County Packers. Saturday’s Class AAAAAA matchup marks the first time since 2009 (Camden County and Northside-WR) that the finals matchup in the state’s larg-est classification does not feature a Gwinnett County school. Roswell beat three Gwinnett schools this postseason (Brookwood, Collins Hill, Grayson) to reach the finals, while Colquitt County eliminated Central Gwinnet and Mill Creek on its road to the Georgia Dome. In or-der for Roswell to complete its perfect season, the Hornets will be tasked with limiting the ex-plosive plays that Colquitt County uses as its metaphorical knockout punches. The Packers are a patient, fundamental and physical football team, but their downfield and perimeter block-ing combines with a deep cast of playmakers that bring a level of explosiveness that Roswell has not faced this season. In the semifinals, the Packers busted out five touchdowns of 48 or more yards and three scores of 73 or more

yards. Roswell must limit the playmaking ability of Colquitt County’s Kiel Pollard, Ty Lee, Ty Pow-ell and company to gain control of the game.

COLQUITT COUNTY (14-0) The Packers continue to make history while representing Georgia as one of the top high school football teams in the country. Un-der head coach Rush Propst, Colquitt County has become a nationally-recognized power-house. Within the state of Georgia, the Pack-ers are the team to beat and for good reason. Colquitt County rides a 29-game win streak into the finals, but it is the complete body of work under Propst the past seven seasons that shows the true success and rise of the program, as well as the unprecedented play-off experience they carry into Saturday’s final. Following a 4-6 finish in Propst’s first season (2008), Colquitt County has averaged 12 wins per season in each year since. This will be the 31st playoff game the team has played in the last seven seasons. The Packers have won 25 of their 30 playoff games under Propst, in-

cluding 15 of 19 on the road. The Packers are a perfect 9-0 at home in the postseason under Propst and have reached the finals three times since 2010. This year’s team is led by one of the most explosive offenses Propst has ever coached. The unit has averaged 47.9 points per game this season, while outscoring opponents by 29.2 points per contest. Senior quarterback Chase Parrish is the commander of the offense and threw for a school-record 431 yards and six touchdowns last Friday in the Packers’ 52-31 win at Mill Creek. Parrish has tossed 39 touch-downs this season and has gone for 3,190 yards through the air. His favorite target is the physical Arkansas-commit Kiel Pollard, who can do it all. Pollard has rushed for 11 scores while hauling in a team-high 18 touchdown passes this season. Pollard can take snaps out of the Wildcat, battle for jump balls and take slants or screens the length of the field on any snap. Ty Lee is another versatile piece to the of-fense and the shifty playmaker teams up with Ty Powell to form what has been an unstoppa-ble stable of skill players. Both Lee and Powell accounted for two touchdowns in the semifinal victory over the Hawks.

ROSWELL (14-0) The playoffs would not be complete with-out miraculous finishes and late-game heroics. The undefeated Hornets dialed up what was the most memorable finish of the 2015 post-season in last week’s semis. In the battle of unbeatens, Grayson took a 26-23 lead when kicker Will VanPamelen hit a 19-yard field goal that put the Rams with 35 seconds left to play. Roswell took over on its own 35-yard line with no timeouts left and in need of season-saving play. On 3rd and 10, quarterback Quin-tarius Neely hit Kendrick Jackson for a 35-yard crossing route that moved Roswell into strik-ing distance. Roswell rushed to the line and Neely spiked the ball to stop the clock with 18 seconds to play. Neely dropped back the next snap and hit A.J. Smith on a 35-yard Hail Mary touchdown pass with 10 seconds to play, capping a remarkable 30-26 win over Gray-son. Smith was well covered on the heave, but leapt up and snagged the winning touchdown on his only catch of the game. Roswell (14-0) overcame four lost fumbles in the victory and returns to the state championship for the first time since 2006, when the Hornets ended up sharing the title with Peachtree Ridge. Ro-

COVER STORY

BY CRAIG SAGER II | CSAGER@SCOREATL.COM

ROSWELL FACES FINAL TEST ON ROAD TO PERFECTION

swell’s Neely has led the offense at a champi-onship level this season. The Lovejoy transfer has accounted for 2,444 yards and 31 passing touchdowns with just five interceptions, while adding nine rushing scores. In the backfield, Sheldon Evans has rushed for 1,684 yards and 27 touchdowns this year. Junior Jayden Com-ma hauled in a game-high 139 receiving yards off six catches in the semis and has 12 scores. Defensively, 6-foot-4, 240-pound linebacker Tre’ Lamar leads the middle of the field and juniors Xavier McKinney and Leanthony Wil-liams spark a ball-hawking secondary. McKin-ney and Williams are both listed as four-star prospects and are in the top 25 for Georgia’s Class of 2017. McKinney is a 6-foot-1 safety committed to Alabama and Williams holds of-fers from Auburn, Alabama, Clemson, Florida and Georgia amongst others. Photos courtesy of Cecil Copeland and Mau-ra Roberts Photography.

ON THE COVER

8 SCORE ATLANTA | www.ScoreAtl.com

Know a young athlete who overcame a serious injury or illness? Nominate them for Comeback Athlete of the Month at choa.org/comeback.

This comeback athlete had a long road back. Today it’s 8.5 miles.

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Allatoona (13-1) is the first Cobb County public school to reach the championship

game since 2011, when Walton lost to Grayson in the final. That Walton team was coached by Rocky Hidalgo, who is now the coach at Glynn Academy. Glynn Academy enters the state championship after successfully conquering one of the toughest roads to the Dome seen this postseason. The Terrors opened the playoffs with Jones County at home and travelled nearly 400 miles in the second round to Dalton where they walked away with a 20-13 win. The quar-terfinals saw a defining moment of the playoff run as head coach Rocky Hidalgo’s team faced what appeared to be certain defeat. Undefeated Stockbridge led 21-7 in the fourth quarter and lined up a yard away from making it 28-7 before the defense came up with the game-saving stop on fourth down. With the ball inside its 1-yard

line, Glynn Academy shifted the momentum by driving 99-yards for the score as Kendall Cross rumbled in a 25-yard touchdown. The defense forced a Stockbridge punt, and senior Garrison Hurd ran the ball down to the 5-yard line to set up Cross’ game-tying score. With 14 seconds left, Banks Entwistle booted through a game-winning 30-yard field goal (24-21). Last Friday, Glynn Academy battled past rival Ware County 24-16 in another thriller. Ware County completed their final pass but was dragged down just shy of the touchdown at the one-yard line to end the game. Quarterback and UGA-commit Deejay Dallas hit Randon Jernigan on a 45-yard touchdown pass in the first quarter, Hurd scored from a yard out, Cross found the end zone, Entwistle drilled a field goal with 6:56 to play and Xavier McClinton intercepted a pass with 1:42 remaining to contribute to another

team victory. Glynn Academy now sits one win away from a school record 13th victory and its first state title since 1964. Hidalgo has produced a quick turnaround since arriving at the school last year from his five-year run as head coach at Walton High School. Hidalgo previously led the Raiders to their first state finals in 2011 with a perfect record before falling to Grayson.

BEATING THE BUCS Allatoona has had to overcome adversity since the first round of the playoffs when the team’s leading rusher Russell Halimon went down in the opening quarter with a knee in-jury. The Arizona commitment paced the Bucs with 1,543 rushing yards before his injury against Winder-Barrow, but the offense has made the necessary adjustments while find-ing new sources of production. Quarterback Brandon Rainey has risen to the occasion at a record-setting pace and the offense has man-aged to rush for 268 yards per game in the playoffs without Halimon. Allatoona hosted No. 1 Houston County in the quarterfinals and Rainey led the Bucs to an unforgettable 59-47 victory. The senior accounted for a school-re-cord seven rushing touchdowns and a season-high 106 yards on the ground. Defensively, the win did not sit well for Allatoona after giving up a staggering 534 yards of offense, but the

Bucs once again made adjustments and locked down Northgate the following week. In the semifinals, Allatoona held Northgate score-less for the first three quarters and allowed just 196 total yards in a 28-7 victory. Rainey got it done on the offensive end again with a 1-yard touchdown run in the opening quarter and a 93-yard touchdown pass to Turner Cock-rell on the Bucs’ next possession. Cockrell is a 6-foot-5 tight end committed to Vanderbilt that has developed into an excellent blocker and weapon in the passing game. Rainey put the game out of reach with another 1-yard run on the second play of the second quarter. Rain-ey has proven to be a dangerous passing threat and has completed 82 of 140 attempts this season for 1579 yards, 16 touchdowns and just four interceptions. His 20 rushing touchdowns leads the team. Defensively, Danny Tesler had two interceptions last Friday and the team as a whole has 16 interceptions on the year. Faizon Harris leads the secondary and had a season-high five pass breakups in the quarterfinals victory over Houston County. Junior Michael Robinson leads the team in tackles with nearly 10 per game. Robinson totaled a season-high 16 tackles in Allatoona’s 30-14 second round victory over Starr’s Mill. Photos courtesy of Chrystal Moore and Gena Churchwell.

CLASS AAAAA MATCHUP

ALLATOONA FACES GLYNN ACADEMY FOR FIRST STATE TITLEBY CRAIG SAGER II | CSAGER@SCOREATL.COM

10 SCORE ATLANTA | www.ScoreAtl.com

In less than a week, the Georgia Bulldogs have parted ways with Mark Richt as their head

coach hired his replacement. If you’ve been that far out of the loop, his name is Kirby Smart and he comes to Athens after coaching with the Alabama Crimson Tide since 2007. It is a homecoming for the new Georgia coach, after he played for the Bulldogs from 1995-98. He also began his coaching career, as an administrative assistant under then head coach Jim Donnan in 1999. Smart grew up here in Georgia and played high school football for his father Sonny at Bainbridge. He got emo-tional on Monday in his opening remarks when speaking about his family. “I’ve thought about this day all of my life,” Smart said. “As the son of a high school coach and the best English teacher in the world, I’ve always aspired to be a head coach. Thanks, mom, thanks, dad, for the example you set for me and for so many others. As most of you know, I spent five of the greatest years of my

A 2-6 start to the season left Panther faith-ful thinking, “Here we go again” as another

long season looked like it was well under way. Behind the senior leadership of Nick Arbuckle, a vastly improved defense and coach Trent Miles, over a month later Georgia State (6-6, 5-3) has stunned the college football land-scape and won four straight games including the icing on the cake last Saturday against rival Georgia Southern, 34-7, to become bowl eli-gible for the first time in school history. With the dominant victory over Southern, who hung 69 points and 613 yards rushing on them a year ago, the Panthers are now set to head down south to Orlando for the AutoNation CureBowl where they meet San Jose State (5-7) on Dec. 19 at 7 P.M. Georgia State faced a daunting task on Saturday. A three hour drive down to States-boro to try and stop the nation’s best rush-ing attack, a seemingly unstoppable force that averaged over 350 yards per game. They

Heading into the 2015-16 men’s college basketball season, nobody expected the

Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets to make any noise in what was expected to be a stacked ACC conference. The critics were half right as the Yellow Jackets battle through their early slate. Georgia Tech is off to a very surprising 6-2 start with two wins over the SEC conference and a very competitive loss to no.9 ranked Villanova. While Georgia Tech does not start conference play until January, their hot start has got a lot of people wondering if they can compete for an NCAA playoff bid next March. Georgia Tech has hit the century mark twice in their first eight games which is some-thing that they have never done under head coach Brian Gregory. In fact, Gregory had never coached a team to 100 points in a single game in his entire career.

Kennesaw State (3-8) picked up an ugly win at home on Monday night against NAIA

Thomas, 69-59. The Owls were tied at the half and trailed 43-39 with 11 minutes remain-ing before using a 16-4 run to take control of the game. Aubrey Williams scored 11 of his 16 points in the second half and Kendrick Ray led all scorers with 21 points and 10 rebounds. Williams also pulled down nine rebounds in the win, but the Night Hawks still managed to outrebound Kennesaw 35-to-34. Tracy Hec-tor played his best game of the season with 12 points on 5-of-6 shooting. Coach Al Skinner was pleased with the win after starting off slow. “This was a good game for us considering our travel and our play in West Virginia. It was important for us to bounce back. Our execu-tion continues to improve, so I’m really happy about that. Defensively, I thought the second half we did a really decent job. We’re learning,

life here in Athens as a student-athlete. As I look throughout this very storied program, there are several coaches that had a great im-pact on my life here.” Smart also thanked the man who he’s re-placing, Mark Richt for giving him a coaching job in 2005. For one season, he served as the Bulldogs running backs coach.

LEARNING FROM THE BEST The Bulldogs new head coach has learned from one of the best football minds in the history of the game, Nick Saban. He started coaching for him in 2004, as his defensive backs coach for the LSU Tigers. He rejoined him in 2006, to coach the safeties for the Mi-ami Dolphins. He’s been with him ever since. “He was great,” Smart said. “His reaction was he’s excited for me. He and I have a great relationship. We spent 11 years together, nine consecutively there at the University of Ala-bama. He’s been a great mentor for me, and he was very supportive. Said he’ll do anything he can to help me and continue that development. He’s always been supportive. He’s got a lot of guys he’s worked with out there in this profes-sion.” Georgia will close out their season on January 2, when they take on Penn State in the Taxpayer Bowl in Jacksonville, Fla.

didn’t only stop it, they shut it down, holding the Eagles to a season-low 135 yards on the ground and even outgaining Southern at their own game, by racking up 143 yards. In total, the Panthers outgained the Eagles 489-to-203 in offense. The Panthers handed the Eagles their worst loss at home in program history and snapped Georgia Southern’s 11-game home field winning streak. “I can’t say enough about our young men and what they’ve accomplished,” coach Miles said. “Our kids came in here believing they could win, and they just finished off four in a row. We talked last night that we weren’t ready for this to end; we’re all having too much fun.” Defensively, the seniors had a field day. Safety Tarris Batiste had two interceptions, two tackles for loss, a forced fumble and eight tackles while linebacker Joseph Peterson had nine tackles and 1.5 tackles for loss. Arbuckle tossed three touchdowns and one interception to go along with his 346 yards. Freshman Penny Hart, who caught sev-en passes for 129 yards and became just the second receiver in program history to go over 1,000 yards receiving in a season, also tied the season-record for receptions (71) and touch-downs (8). Arbuckle said after the game, “People are going to look back, decades from now, at us as the first team to win the rivalry and first team to go to a bowl game. It’s just an incredible feeling.”

LEADING THE CHARGE Marcus Georges-Hunt is leading the Yel-low Jackets in scoring with 14.6 points per game while Charles Mitchell is a close second with average of 14.5. Alabama transfer Nick Ja-cobs got off to an incredible start after scoring double-digit points in each of the Yellow Jack-ets first four games including a 23-point show-ing against Tennessee, but has since fallen off to a 10.6 average per game. Another bright spot for the Yellow Jackets has been their ability to rebound. Mitchell is cur-rently leading the ACC conference in rebounds with 13 per game. As a team the Yellow Jackets are averaging 43.5 rebounds per game good enough for third best in the ACC. Mitchell is also fourth in the ACC in field goal percentage. Georgia Tech has had a good history of cranking out players into the NBA including Miami Heat star Chris Bosh and Derrick Favors but haven’t quite had the talent in the last few season to stay competitive in the ACC. If the Yellow Jacket are able to keep up their great play, they could very well find themselves in a spot in the tournament next March. Georgia Tech hosts VCU next Tuesday before visiting the rival Georgia Bulldogs next Saturday for a noon tipoff.

and as I’ve said before, it’s a process and guys are learning it. From that, it’s going to allow us to continue to be successful.”

DYNAMIC DUO Though the Owls haven’t played that well this season, one bright spot has been Quinni-piac transfer Kendrick Ray. The guard had two rough shooting games to open the season but has caught his stride and now leads the team with 16.1 points per game. He is shooting 45 percent on the season and leads the team in assists per game with 2.5. One of the most impressive parts of Ray’s play has been his tenacious rebounding from his guard position, ranking second on the team with 6.5 a night. Yonel Brown, last year’s leading scorer, has not shot as well from the field, shooting 36 percent. His 16.0 points per game average is the second-best on the team while playing a team-high 39.3 minutes per game. For KSU to take flight and stay competitive the rest of the season, Nigel Pruitt will need to step up his play. He averaged over 12 points per game in 2014, good for second-best on the team, but has taken a step back at 9.3 per game this season. The senior is down from making 2.2 threes per game to 1.1. Newcomer Aubrey Wil-liams has been a pleasant surprise, scoring 8.5 points per game and leading the team in rebounding with 7.5.

UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA

GEORGIA STATE

GEORGIA TECH

KENNESAW STATE

BY DAN MATHEWS | DMATHEWS@SCOREATL.COM

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BY CRAIG SAGER II | CSAGER@SCOREATL.COM

KIRBY SMART ERA BEGINS

LET’S GO BOWLING!

JACKETS CONTINUE UNEXPECTED START

OWLS NEWCOMERS MAKING MAJOR IMPACT

11Vol. 11 Iss. 41 | December 3-9, 2015

The good news: Atlanta handled the Lakers at Philips on Friday, 100-87. The bad news:

It has now been over a month since the Hawks have had a winning streak. Finding a consisten-cy has been a problem all along for the Hawks. The current trend of loss-win-loss-win dates back to Nov. 18. The epitome of .500 ball has seen the team sink to third place in the South-east division standings and hold just a game lead over the Magic for fourth place. So what has gone wrong? Let’s start with the draft day acquisition of Tim Hardaway Jr. which has been an unmitigated disaster. The former Knick has bounced around the D-League and has appeared in just four NBA games this season. Paul Millsap and Kent Bazemore have been the lone bright spots as everyone else has either play close to their level a year ago, or be-neath it. Coach Budenholzer thought they ad-dressed a need by acquiring Tiago Splitter from

The Atlanta Braves continued their fire-sale of established stars when they traded start-

ing pitcher Shelby Miller on Tuesday night. While the loss is a substantial one, Atlanta’s rebuilding project and subsequent youth movement picked up alarming steam in the form of three prospects from the Arizona Dia-mondbacks. In exchange for Miller, the Braves acquired outfielder Ender Inciarte, right-hand-ed pitcher Aaron Blair and shortstop Dansby Swanson. Inciarte, 25, batted .303 with six home runs, 21 stolen bases and a mere 58 strikeouts in 561 plate appearances during his second full season in Arizona. The left-hander could play center field and lead off for Atlan-ta. Blair, 23, went 12-5 with a 2.92 ERA in 26 games (25 starts) across both Double-A and Triple-A this past year. He also recorded 120 strikeouts in 160.1 innings. Swanson, of Mari-etta High School, was the No. 1 overall pick in the 2015 June draft from Vanderbilt University. “It’s a team effort, but this deal doesn’t happen without [Coppolella],” Braves’ presi-

Frustrations grow as the Falcons (6-6) con-tinue to struggle and have now dropped six

of their last seven games after a misleading 5-0 start. The latest setback came in a 23-19 loss at Tampa Bay. Julio Jones had eight catches for 93 yards and surpassed 100 catches for the season, but he did not have a touchdown for the fourth consecutive game. Following the game, Jones made headlines by expressing his concerns about the red zone play calling. “I just go out there and just do what I’m told to do,” Jones said. “If we’re getting those looks, I think they’ll call those plays. But I don’t know. I don’t know what we’re getting down there. I don’t know what the thinking is as far as if we’re going to throw the jump balls or if we’re going to run the ball or whatever look we’re getting down there. We practice throughout the week throwing jump balls, throwing fades, throwing all these little things. But when the game comes, you never know what’s going to

Tuesday night featured some big early sea-son showdowns between teams in Region 7

and 8. In 7-AAAAAA, No. 4 Norcross went on the road and thumped No. 6 Collins Hill, 93-72. The Blue Devils’ size and guard play was too much for shorthanded Collins Hill to overcome. Rayshaun Hammonds scored 25 points to do the frontcourt damage while Kyle Sturdivant, Jordan Goldwire and Dalvin White chipped in 19, 17 and 16 points respectively. The Eagles, who were without their starting point guard Max Clark and backup Dez Howard due to in-jury, received a game-high 31 points from TeS-haun Hightower. Duluth defeated Peachtree Ridge thanks to a balanced attack. Adam Flagler finished with 16 points and five assists to pace the Wildcats in the 62-55 victory. Javis Diaz added 13 and Jalen Hodges netted 14 in the win. The Lions were led by Milz Tatum’s 15 points.

CRAZY 8’S Region 8-AAAAAA saw Berkmar come

the San Antonio Spurs, but it turns out that Splitter is still Splitter, a below average center averaging 5.6 points and 3.6 rebounds. Den-nis Schroder’s production has leveled off and declined after publicly saying he wants to start this year. Kyle Korver remains a specialist and a liability on defense while Mike Scott, a key piece off the bench, continues to be phased out by Budenholzer, playing him 11.6 minutes per game, his lowest mark since his rookie season. Atlanta was expected to take a step back this year, but in the fashion they are doing it, it has left fans uneasy and longing for the days of Pero Antic and the Junkyard Dog, DeMarre Carroll.

LOS ANGELES LOSERS With a win against the Lakers last week, Atlanta will now visit Dallas for an ESPN Wednesday broadcast looking to start an elu-sive win streak. Five Hawks scored in double figures in the Los Angeles game. Al Horford scored 16 points and grabbed nine rebounds while Millsap and Bazemore both added 15 points apiece. Lou Williams, a former South Gwinnett superstar, returned home to lead all scorers with 18 points off the bench for LA. Kobe Bry-ant continued one of the worst shooting sea-sons in NBA history, going 4-of-19 from the field for 14 points. He is now shooting 30 per-cent from the field and 22 percent from beyond the three-point line.

dent of baseball operations John Hart said of general manager John Coppolella. “This one you have to tip your hat to John and the yeo-man’s work he did to put this thing together. We wanted to make it painful for [the Dia-mondbacks] with players that we got back. They are players that we think are going to be a big part of our future. We’re obviously happy with what we got back, otherwise we wouldn’t have made the deal. But let’s not lose sight that Arizona got back some really good value, too.” Miller went 6-17 in his only season with Atlanta because of nightmarish run support, but the 25-year-old compiled a 3.02 ERA in 205.1 innings while striking out 171 batters and walking only 73.

SIGN IT LIKE BECKHAM The Braves signed infielder Gordon Beck-ham, an Atlanta native, to a one-year contract last week. Beckham played for Westminster in high school before starring at the University of Georgia. The 29-year-old, who has spent almost his entire career with the White Sox, turned in his best season as a rookie in 2009 with a .270 average, 14 home runs, 63 RBIs, 58 runs scored and seven stolen bases. He will al-most certainly play third base for the Braves, either starting or perhaps in a platoon situation with Adonis Garcia. Beckham posted the following a Twitter: “Pretty amazing to grow up in Atlanta, go to UGA, and then put on the uniform of the @Braves. Trying to make sure I’m not dreaming..lets go!”

come up.” The Falcons are 3-1 in games where Jones reaches the end zone. On Sunday, Jones was targeted four times in the red zone, with two catches. He was not targeted in five goal-to-go situations. “Our main focus is to score when we get in the red zone -- not field goals,” Jones said. “We just have to get better in the red zone.” Jones was the target on Ryan’s intercep-tion with 1 minute, 39 seconds remaining in regulation, which sealed the win for the Bucca-neers. Bucs linebacker Lavonte David dropped deep into coverage and picked off the under-thrown ball. Falcons coach Dan Quinn said the Fal-cons, at 6-6, can make the playoffs but has yet to provide details for possible solutions to the offensive woes.

CLOSING THE YEAR Atlanta’s final four games will challenge the team as they face the undefeated Carolina Panthers on the road this week before taking on the Jaguars. Atlanta returns home for its final two weeks and will face Carolina for the second time in three weeks before the season finale with New Orleans. Atlanta went 5-0 in the division last year before ending the season with a demoralizing loss to Carolina. Including last year’s 34-3 loss to Carolina, the Falcons have lost four straight division games.

away with a statement win over previously undefeated Grayson. The Patriots, who were ranked in the top ten to open the season, have since fallen out while the Rams looked primed to crack the state picture. Berkmar put those plans on hold as Darius Harrison and Jay Es-time teamed up to blast Grayson, 72-46. Harri-son finished with 20 points and eight rebounds while Estime poured in 22 points. No. 9 Dacula came back from down 11 points with four minutes to play to force over-time with a 69-68 win over South Gwinnett. The Falcons gutted out a win behind Derek St. Hilaire’s 25 points and Kevon Tucker’s 18 points, who fouled out. Juwan white scored 12 and freshman point guard Mekhail Bethea added 10 big points in the win. Brookwood continued to use a balanced attack to score another Region 8 victory, 70-63 against Archer. Micah Kinsey did it all, scoring 22 points, grabbing seven rebounds, dishing four assists and collecting four steals. Big man Amari Kelly posted a double-double with 16 points and 11 rebounds. In Region 8-AAAAA, No. 2 Gainesville pulled yet another game out of the fire to re-main undefeated with an 80-77 win in double overtime over No. 5 Cedar Shoals. Cedar Shoals led 34-25 at the half as Gainesville did not start D’Marcus Simonds for assumed disciplinary reasons. Simonds scored a game-high 40 and was aided by Tae Turner’s 16 points. Stavion Stevenson paced the Jaguars with 19 points and 10 rebounds. Jerrick Mitchell chipped in 18 points, six assists and four steals.

ATLANTA HAWKS

ATLANTA BRAVES

ATLANTA FALCONS

THE TRANSFER CORNER

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BY KYLE SANDY | KSANDY@SCOREATL.COM

CONSISTENCY ESCAPES HAWKS

BRAVES BRING IN HUGE HAUL BY TRADING MILLER

FALCONS CONTINUE HISTORIC COLLAPSE

STATEMENTS MADE IN REGIONS 7 & 8

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13Vol. 11 Iss. 41 | December 3-9, 2015