There have been some unbelievable streaks in Georgia during the history of high school football. Calhoun’s 119-game winning streak in region play from 2001-19 may stand as one that will never be broken.
Buford’s 10 consecutive seasons of making the championship game, spanning four different classifications, is another that will be hard to top.
Right now, Rabun County is working on a 44-game win streak in Region 8-2A, the longest such active streak in the state. According to the Georgia High School Football Historians Association (GHSFHA), that is now tied for the 14th-longest region win streak in state history.
The Wildcats’ streak began on Oct. 25, 2013 with a 42-18 win over rival Union County. Their last region loss came to Washington-Wilkes the week before, 52-7, on the road. In fact, they lost two straight region games that year, also losing to Jefferson, 26-20 in overtime, the week before Washington-Wilkes.
Since those back-to-back losses in 2013, Rabun County also has now gone 103 games since dropping consecutive games in the same season.
Rabun County takes on Banks County this week in Homer looking to add on to both of those. If they win their final three region games of 2021, beginning with the Leopards, they would tie Cartersville (2011-18) and Lovett (1982-91) for the eighth-longest such streak in GHSA history (47).
As for other programs in the area, according to GHSFHA, which charted region win streaks longer than 39 games, Buford is on the list twice. The Wolves had a 58-game streak from 2001-08 -- sixth longest -- and also a 43-game streak from 2012-18 -- tied for the 17th longest streak.
THAT’S JUST TOTALLY OFFENSIVE: Offense has been the catalyst in high school football for more than a dozen years now. No matter how explosive a team is, they’re always looking for more.
And there have been some huge offensive shootouts in Hall County in recent years. But none like last week’s Chestatee-East Hall showdown at the Lynn Cottrell Complex.
The War Eagles and Vikings produced the highest-scoring game ever between Hall County teams in the War Eagles’ 62-50 win. It beat the previous record, set in 2008 between West Hall and Johnson, by 1 skinny point.
Of the top five all-time highest-scoring games between Hall County teams, East Hall and Chestatee have given us two classic shootouts in consecutive seasons.
Here are the top five highest-scoring games in Hall County history:
2021 -- Chestatee-East Hall -- 112 (CHS, 62-50)
2008 -- West Hall-Johnson -- 111 (WH, 56-55)
2016 -- North Hall-East Hall -- 110 (NH, 68-42)
2020 -- East Hall-Chestatee -- 105 (EH, 55-50)
2013 -- Gainesville-Flowery Branch -- 100 (GHS, 55-45)
STAT LEADERS FROM WEEK 9: Four Northeast Georgia players lead their respective classifications in either rushing, passing, or receiving after Week 8 of the 2021 season.
Despite the area putting up some big numbers on the ground in 2021, two of the four are the top receivers in their classifications.
Towns County’s Kyle Oakes leads Class A Public in rushing; Rabun County’s Gunner Stockton leads Class 2A in passing; Rabun’s Jaden Gibson leads Class 2A and the state in receiving; and Dawson County’s Bailey Dameron leads Class 3A in receiving.
Eight area players now sit in the top 59 rushers in the state, all classifications. Oakes, a senior, has 1,066 yards, which is good for 11th overall in the state, and leads Omari Arnold of Brooks County by more than 200 yards. North Hall senior Kevin Rochester has climbed into 9th place in the state with 1,083 yards and remains in second in Class 3A behind Hart County’s J.L. Lackey (1,200 yards).
As for others in the area, Trey Ranson of Jackson County is 34th with 815 yards, Tyler Crow of East Jackson is 39th with 797 yards, Cherokee Bluff’s Jayquan Smith is 41st with 787 yards, Jefferson’s Sammy Brown is 51st with 753 yards, Silas Mulligan of White County is 55th with 741 yards, and Commerce freshman Jaiden Daniels now has 719 yards, almost all coming over the past three weeks, to rapidly climb the charts.
With all the ground attacks in 2021, the passing game for area teams is down overall with only two players now in the top 57 in the state in passing yards.
Of course, Rabun County’s Gunner Stockton continues to climb the season rankings and last week set the state’s all-time total touchdown record, now at 215, after a 6-TD performance against Grovetown broke former Gainesville standout Deshaun Watson’s record set in 2013. Stockton now has 152 career touchdown passes and is just three behind Watson (155) and just six behind Trevor Lawrence (Cartersville, 2014 - 2017), who owns the record at 161. He is now just 1,000 yards behind Jake Fromm, who is third all-time.
Currently, Stockton leads Class 2A and is now second in the state overall in 2021 with 2,207 yards, just 75 yards behind Prince Avenue Christian’s Aaron Philo (2,282 yards).
The only other area quarterback is Chestatee’s Luke Bornhorst, who is third in Class 4A and 21st overall with 1,476 yards. Bornhorst sits 239 yards behind classification lead Holden Geriner of Benedictine, who has 1,715 yards on the season.
In the receiving rankings, Rabun County’s Gibson increased his lead statewide after another big game last week and now has 966 yards, which leads Damare Franklin of Veterans (844 yards) by more than 100 yards.
Dawson County’s Dameron sits fourth overall with 740 yards and leads Class 3A. But he is just 6 yards ahead of Cam’ron Lacy of Stephens County (734 yards) who is fifth overall and second in Class 3A.
White County’s Darius Cannon is third in Class 3A and 22nd overall with 583 yards. Hunter Fouche of Chestatee is now second in Class 4A with 558 yards and 27th overall. Towns County’s Collin Crowder is second in Class A Public with 549 yards receiving and is tied for 29th overall.
(Stat information provided by Georgia High School Football Historians Association.)
