It’s that time of year!! The sights and sounds of the holiday season are all around. Football fans , however, might delay heading to the mall and instead find their way to Downtown Atlanta this week.Just days after the SEC’s big show rolled out of town there are still more football related happenings in the city . Take your pick, there is so much to choose from .
You can start on Decatur Street where Georgia State is basking in the afterglow of shocking the world with a resounding victory at Georgia Southern to secure the Panthers first ever bowl trip.Between now and the Cure Bowl in Orlando look for a lot of blue paint and the GSU logo to show up on all buildings around the campus, and on most of the people who go anywhere near those buildings.
A short drive away, the College Football Hall Of Fame will open it’s doors to the top college football players in the nation for the Home Depot College Football Awards. This is the 25th anniversary of the event that has moved from Orlando to Atlanta and the Hall Of Fame. Clemson’s Deshaun Watson will be among the nation’s best who will gather in the shadows of the Georgia Dome on the night before the Main Event.
Of course when I say the Main Event, I am speaking of GHSA High School Football State Championship Weekend. It is high school football’s show of shows and no other state does it better than we do it here in Georgia. It’s kind of ironic that Watson would visit Atlanta on this particular week, on his way to New York City and the Heisman Trophy Award Ceremony. This fall the rest of the country discovered what we already knew. It was in 2012 that Deshaun Watson led a Gainesville team that scored 60+ points 4 times on its way to a victory over Ware County in the AAAAA championship game.
I’m not surprised that Watson is headed for New York this weekend and as I watch this years state finals, I can’t help wondering if we will be watching players who may soon follow in his footsteps. Could it be Roswell’s Tre Lamar, who will play at Clemson next fall ? Maybe it will be Colquitt County’s Kiel Pollard, who is Arkansas-Bound, or Cartersville’s Trevor Lawrence who is already showing promise as a Heisman Hopeful but we will have to wait a while. Lawrence, one of the nation’s most talked about high school signal callers still has two more years of high school.
These are just a few of the players who will be in display as 14 teams will rumble for 7 titles over 2 days at the Georgia Dome.
GHSA Football Finals at Georgia Dome
Dec. 11
Class A-Public | 1 PM
Clinch County vs. Irwin County
Class AAA | 4:30 PM
Westminster vs. Blessed Trinity
Class AAAAA | 8 PM
Allatoona vs. Glynn Academy
Dec. 12
Class A-Private | 10AM
ELCA vs. Aquinas
Class AA | 1PM
Fitzgerald vs. Pace Academy
Class AAAA | 4:30PM
Buford vs. Cartersville
Class AAAAAA | 8PM
Roswell vs. Colquitt County
Once again GPB Sports will have live coverage of all 7 state championship games. For the professionals who week after week work on camera and behind the scenes this is the grand finale to the 2015 high school football season and this is a weekend that always brings out their best. I am thrilled to be a member of the GPB Sports crew again this year and look forward to working along side Tommy Palmer for the Class 1-A Public and Class 1-A Private Championship games.I will also be on the sidelines for the Class AAAA game with Jon Nelson and Chuck Smith in the booth.
I hope that you can make it to the Georgia Dome, but if you can’t make it, be sure to join us on GPB Sports or on line at gpb.org/sports.