The first quarter of the season is behind us and despite some outstanding starts by several northeast Georgia area teams, they are not getting much love from sports writers around the state.
Cherokee Bluff, East Hall, and East Forsyth all are 3-0 in the early going. Only Bluff of those three has received any votes to this point. Yes, strength-of-schedule does matter in the end, but all three of those teams had high expectations coming into the season and have not disappointed to this point. But all three have some intriguing matchups tonight that could help sway some voters next week with convincing wins.
But they aren’t the only teams to be passed over so far. Just four teams in our coverage currently are ranked in the AccessWDUN Composite poll this week.
Buford (Class 6A), Gainesville (5A), and Jefferson (3A) all are ranked second in their classifications. Rabun County is ranked seventh in Class Division 1. That’s it.
Lumpkin County in Class 3A is the only other team in our area to receive any votes.
Commerce, who was ranked all of last season and opened the 2024 campaign in the top five in Class A D1, dropped out of the poll after two losses to open the season.
POWER REGIONS
We looked at what were the power regions after the first two weeks of the season and determined it was hit or miss for most of the eight area regions that comprise teams in our coverage area in the Georgia High School Association. So where do things stand now heading into Friday’s action?
According to the computer Maxwell Ratings, several area regions have begun to slide down the power rankings list. Two area regions have plummeted to the bottom of their classifications.
Region 8-5A, which has Habersham Central and Jackson County, sits at the bottom with a 56.26 rating. The top region in 5A (Region 2, which has Lee County) has the strongest power rating of any region in any classification in the state at 88.25. Basically, the ratings say that the good teams in 2-5A would be 32-point favorites over a good team in 8-5A. Yikes.
Region 6-3A, which has many Hall County teams and Dawson County, Lumpkin County, and White County, sits at the bottom of Class 3A with a 50.5 power rating. Region 8-3A, which has Jefferson, Cherokee Bluff, East Hall, and West Hall, is rated second-best in Class 3A at 66.50. That is just .07 behind top-rated 2-3A, which has three teams ranked in the top 10.
As for the rest of the regions, Region 8-6A, which has Buford, has begun to climb the charts in 6A. After the first two weeks, 8-6A sat near the bottom. But with Collins Hill a,d Mill Creek now both undefeated and ranked, 8-6A is now third at 80.16. Region 2-6A with No. 1-ranked Carrollton and No. 3 Douglas County has been perched at the top all season and has an 86.25 rating.
Region 6-6A with North Forsyth has climbed out of the bottom of 6A but is seventh among the eight regions at 69.09.
Region 8-4A with East Forsyth and Flowery Branch is rated fourth at 66.19 and Region 8-2A, with East Jackson and Stephens County (ranked second) is second in Class 2A at 67.58.
STATE STAT LEADERS
A quarter of the way through the 2024 season, several northeast players have cracked the early top 20 in rushing, passing, and receiving yardage to be among the state leaders to this point. One, Tysean Wiggins at Commerce, leads his classification, according to the comprehensive stats released by Georgia High School Football Daily on Friday.
Here are the top area players that are in the top 20 after Week 3 of the season:
Wiggins leads the area and Class A Division 1, and is fourth overall in the state, with 531 yards rushing. The only other area rusher in the top 20 is West Hall’s Elijah Hayes, who is 11th overall with 453 yards and is second in Class 3A, just 1 yard behind Amari Latimer of Sandy Creek.
Among the state’s leading passers, newcomer Kharim Hghley has turned some early heads. The Gainesville sophomore sits fourth overall in the state with 811 yards, but that is only good enough for second in Class 5A. Hughley sits 147 yards behind classification and state leader Antwann Hill Jr. of Houston County, who has thrown for 958 yards already.
The only other area passer in the top 20 is East Forsyth’s Brock Szakacs, who is 17th overall with 710 yards. Szakacs is 2nd in Class 4A behind Devin Edmonds of Jones County, who has 821 yards.
In receiving, only Gainesville’s Shane King currently is in the top 20. King has hauled 304 yards, which is 17th overall. However, in a pass-happy Class 5A, that is good only for 6th in the classification in the first quarter of the season.
