Colin Lacy
Play Ball
By: Colin Lacy
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
It’s college baseball’s Opening Day! With the beginning of the season looming, let’s dive into what this season could look like for a couple clubs across the state of Georgia.
Georgia Tech: This season will be the 130th season of baseball for the Jackets and 32nd year under head coach Danny Hall.
Last season saw the white and gold finish with a 33-25 record thanks to rattling off four straight series wins in ACC play in the month of April and winning five of the last seven series in the regular season.
The 2024 campaign ended in the finals of the Athens Regional as a 10-inning loss at the hands of the in-state rival Georgia kept the Jackets from advancing to a Super Regional and continues the drought that hasn’t seen the Jackets advance past a regional since 2006.
The 2025 season will see many fresh faces to the Flats with 31 newcomers into the program this season. Inside that list of newcomers includes the nation’s #2 ranked freshman class by Perfect Game with 21 freshmen coming into the program.
In addition, there will also be a good nucleus of returners for GT led by Drew Burress who took the college baseball world by storm last season.
Burress in his rookie season last year set the Freshman record for homeruns at Georgia Tech with 25 long balls in route to hitting .381 and driving in 67 RBI while collecting ACC Freshman of the Year and named a Golden Spikes Award semifinalist.
Obviously, there are huge expectations for Burress coming into 2025 being named the D1 Baseball pre-season ACC Player of the Year, but other names add to the list of returners to watch.
Tate McKee also showed flashes as a freshman last year on the mound and is expected to be the Opening Day starter for the Jackets on the bump to build off the 4-5 record in 18 appearances (8 starts) last season.
Again, I may be biased (calling GT Baseball games on radio every day), but this Jackets club has the potential to be special.
Drew Burress said it perfectly in the pre-season media availability when he said, “This team has a lot more talent than last year, so the celling is so much higher, but at this point the floor is much lower because we haven’t hit the field.” A lot to prove, but also a lot to be excited about in Midtown Atlanta.
Georgia: Year one for the Bulldogs under new Head Coach Wes Johnson proved to be successful with hosting a Super Regional at Foley Field after winning the Athens Regional.
The off-season has been about construction. In the literal sense, Foley Field has undergone a $45 million renovation upgrade process with incredible additions to one of the country’s best atmospheres to begin with. In the figurative side, Wes Johnson has gone to work “constructing” a much deeper club for the Dawgs in 2025.
Even with the departures of Charlie Condon and Corey Collins in the middle of the lineup, many across the country believe that UGA will be deeper and more balanced up and down the lineup than last year with both returners and some portal acquisitions.
Two of the three outfielders expected to trot out of the dugout this weekend for the Dawgs come from the transfer portal with former Duke Blue Devil Devin Obee and Kentucky transfer Nolan McCarthy expected to play left and center, respectively.
Pair those two immediate impact players with some returners of Tre Phelps, Kolby Branch and Slate Alford, and Wes Johnson has a much deeper starting 9. While the Dawgs finished 2024 with an impressive 43-17 record, the pre-season #9 team in the nation has one thought on the mind…Omaha.
It’s a wonderful time of year. In addition to high level basketball, baseball season is here as MLB Pitchers and Catchers reported earlier this week, and this weekend, the bats will ping, the smell of hotdogs and popcorn will roll through college baseball cathedrals, and it’s time to play ball.
Pro Bowl Sting
By: Colin Lacy
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
The NFL world flocked to Orlando last weekend to watch the game’s best in the 2025 Pro Bowl Games. The “game’s best” applies in a couple of different scenarios.
The obvious is that of Jared Goff, Fred Warner and Bijan Robinson, some of the best in the NFL, but also applies to the names Jaci Kitchings and Jadyn Williams.
Jaci and Jadyn are two seniors that wrapped up their careers at Southeast Bulloch with the school’s fourth consecutive state championship back in December but represented the NFC squad in the first NFL Girls Flag All-Star Game.
The inaugural event put on by the NFL saw thirty high school girls from all over the country (even two from Alaska) which included the two SEB Yellow Jackets competing in a flag football All-Star game to kick off the festivities on Sunday at the 2025 NFL Pro Bowl Games.
The NFL rolled out the red carpet for the Girls Flag Football All-Star Game participants including Kitchings and Williams.
The two Jacket players were flown down to Orlando on Friday before the Sunday afternoon game and not only got gear for the event, but the opportunity to take in some of the local attractions in Orlando and events with the NFL Pro Bowl players.
“They have had the best experience,” said SEB Head Flag Football Coach Marci Cochran. “What a great event by the NFL and I’m super excited they both got to participate.”
Jaci and Jadyn found out that they were named to the thirty-girl roster just before the semifinals of the GHSA state tournament and were ecstatic to get the news but had unfinished business to take care of.
They would find themselves in familiar ground on the stage in Atlanta after an overtime thriller having won their fourth consecutive state championship and capping off an 82-1 record in their SEB careers.
Southeast Bulloch Flag Football burst on the scene in 2021 when the program began (when Kitchings and Williams were freshmen) and have won the state championship each of the first four years of the program’s existence and winning 82 out of 83 games played in program history. The lone loss in program history came this year against the private school sector in Calvary Day out of Savannah.
I got to catch up with SEB Head Coach Marci Cochran as she watched Jadyn and Jaci play in the All-Star game in Orlando and looking back on the last four years she said “After starting four years ago and lost our first game this year which was devastating but in the long run it helped us win another state title. Four in a row which is more than any other team in the state of Georgia. We’re super excited about the growth of our program and adding a middle school program last year which helped us too.”
Coach Cochran has seen every snap that both Jadyn and Jaci have taken in their flag football careers and have become not only trendsetters on the national level at the Pro Bowl Games but also helped set the fantastic foundation of the SEB program.
“They’re the first seniors that have completed all four years, so they’re very special to us and we hate to be losing them,” Cochran said holding back tears. “Jaci has grown so much. Her development and dedication are awesome. Jadyn was always a really good player, but to watch her learn the game and understand the game is fun and to watch both of them grow from freshmen to seniors is really impressive.”
The NFL has made a concerted effort from the NFL League Office all the way down to the different teams investing in the sport of flag football at all levels, but especially at the high school level.
“For the sport as a whole, the Falcons itself sponsor a team in Alabama and there’s a couple other states that they’re starting to dive into to be able to start flag football there,” said Cochran. “Just the money and support they give for all these schools to be able to provide a flag football program without it having to come out of their own pocket is huge. It’s expensive to start a new sport, so their involvement in flag football has been awesome.”
While Kitchings and Williams will get to do it one more time as SEB heads to Canton, Ohio for the National Flag Football High School Tournament, the experience at the NFL Pro Bowl Games really put a nice bow on a historic career for these two and would have been hard to believe a couple years ago said Coach Cochran.
“To see them get to play down here (in Orlando) and see this opportunity. To be in this stadium, to have the game broadcasted on ESPN even with the Goodyear Blimp. Who would have ever thought that four years ago? So, it’s really special to be down here with them.”
Useless?
By: Colin Lacy
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
Before the NFL crowns a champion in Super Bowl LIX between the Kansas City Chiefs and Philadelphia Eagles, the NFL world flocks to Orlando for the Pro Bowl (or what has turned into being called the Pro Bowl Games).
Instead of a full exhibition game, the NFL has made the change to a Flag Football game along with a collection of skills competitions and “field day” type events.
While there’s no question that the honor of being named to the Pro Bowl, does the actual event mean anything?
Before we dive into the current rendition of the pro football version of the All-Star Game, let’s look back at how we got here.
There have been many iterations of a “Pro Bowl,” and it began in January of 1939 as the NFL All-Star Game. The NFL All-Star Game saw that year’s league champion (starting with the 1938 New York Giants) against a team of all-stars from the other teams around the league. The first time that the phrase “Pro Bowl” was used came in the 1951 when the best from the American/Eastern Conference taking on the top of the National/Western Conference.
After the merger of the AFL & the NFL in 1970, the celebration of the game’s best turned into the AFC-NFC Pro Bowl. The league’s exhibition match-up largely looked the same until 2023 (aside from the league flirting with a nonconference format from 2014-2016).
2023 marked the first rendition of the Pro Bowl Games with flag football and other random events that have changed each of the last three years.
Most fans remember that for three decades (1980-2009) the Pro Bowl game was held in Aloha Stadium in Halawa, Hawaii. The game would be moved to Miami for the 2010 rendition of the game before returning to Hawaii in 2011 until 2014.
There have been a couple of mainstays in the skills competitions over the last three years with Flag Football and dodgeball, but each year brings new competitions with some being more…creative…than others.
I’ve been able to be at this year and last year’s Pro Bowl Games and to be on the field in Orlando around the game’s best.
While many fans and even media have written the game off as a waste of time, this game still truly means something to many of the players bestowed with the honor of being named to the Pro Bowl.
That being said, you do have players each year that “opt out” of the Pro Bowl.
In fact, this year has 16 players named to either the AFC or NFC squad that won’t be in Orlando participating for a litany of reasons which doesn’t include the eleven combined members of the two teams that are competing in the Super Bowl a week later.
Full transparency, I was skeptical of what the point of the event was going into my first experience with the game a year ago, but after talking to players and folks around the game, for the players it’s a wonderful experience.
Obviously it’s a tremendous honor to be named to the rosters, but you have some players that are experiencing it for the first time as a young player and get to be around the best of the best for a few days and pick the brains of those that they likely grew up idolizing.
Others use it as a chance to catch up with friends or former teammates that they may not have seen since the last Pro Bowl.
Whatever the individual rational, there was one overwhelming theme that came up time after time. That it was a fantastic way for their families to get away and decompress after a long and grueling season and be around families that are wrapping up the same grind and strengthen the community between the families.
So, does the event draw the TV numbers or revenue that even this game once did? Not even close, but it absolutely means a great deal to the guys that this game is intended to honor.
Profar Potential?
By: Colin Lacy
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
Finally…Finally we have a newsworthy headline coming out of Truist Park. The Atlanta Braves and Jurickson Profar have agreed to a three-year deal to bring the 2024 All-Star to Braves Country.
After an offseason that seemingly only had departures from “the A,” the Braves fill a void in the outfield that virtually everyone around the Braves organization had in the top 2 of needs going into the 2025 season.
Profar had by far his best season of his 11-year MLB Career with the Padres in 2024 and knocked out many career firsts. The Curacao native notched his first career All-Star Game appearance, first career Silver Slugger and finished in the top 15 in the voting for the NL MVP Award.
Career bests were aplenty in 2024 for Profar. The 31-year-old knocked an eleven year best .280 average while driving home a career high 85 RBIs and a career most 24 homeruns.
While last season for Profar was spectacular, was it an anomaly? Profar is a career .245 hitter with only three 20-homer seasons including 2024 (the others coming in back-to-back years in 2018 & 2019). Is Profar able to replicate the successes of 2024 while donning the Braves uniform in 2025? Only time will tell.
Should this alleviate the frustrations of Braves fans that were caused by the quiet off-season? To me, that answer is… partially.
This could be a good piece for Atlanta. Besides coming off the career year for Profar, he is also a versatile veteran that has appeared at seven different positions in his big-league career (has only not appeared as a pitcher and catcher).
While Profar has settled into a leftfielder (148 of the 158 appearances coming in LF), he has seen significant time in a year at shortstop, second base, and first base. This is unquestioned an attempt to fill the outfield void, but I’m just playing devil’s advocate that there are other plus sides to this move that may not shine through until a worst-case scenario comes to fruition.
The flip side of the stance that this move partially curbs the frustration of Braves Country is that this move can’t be THE move of the offseason.
Earlier it was mentioned that filling the void in the outfield was probably in the top two needs moving forward for the Bravos, the other would-be starting pitching.
The Braves have already seen Max Fried sign with the Yankees and Charlie Morton sign with the Orioles pairing that with the fact that Spencer Strider won’t be fully healthy when the team breaks camp to begin the 2025 campaign, it means the Braves have to bring in a solid at worst starter.
Before the Profar signing, Braves beat writer Mark Bowman reported that sources inside the Braves organization had said the club would be sitting right around the $33 million range for added salary going into 2025. Now that Profar is earning $12 million of his 3-year $42 million deal in 2025, assuming that number stays similar, it gives the Braves about $20 million to work with to find rotation help.
Atlanta had talks with Nathan Eovaldi for figures around that $20 million mark before Eovaldi signed a three-year deal with the Rangers worth a total of $75 million.
So, who is still on the market for starting pitching? There have been a couple free-of free-agents that have been picked around and still available in guys like Jack Flaherty, but the free-agent market is starting to become bare. I believe a trade is the more likely target for General Manager Alex Anthopolous.
All of that said, I’m not saying that Jurickson Profar is a wasted move. It’s a good piece added to the Braves lineup and at least partially answers the outfield question, but it can’t be the biggest move of the offseason if the Braves want to be reloaded and ready to roll into 2025.
$180 Million Backup
By: Colin Lacy
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
With the NFL Wild Card round starting for the 2024 postseason this weekend, one team that had a shot to play on into postseason, but came up short to end the regular season made some news as Atlanta Falcons GM Terry Fontenot met with the media Thursday afternoon.
Fontenot met with the media and when asked about the plan for Kirk Cousins, the Falcons GM said the Atlanta is “comfortable” with having the $180 million QB serve as the back-up moving forward.
“We are very comfortable moving forward with (Cousins) as backup,” Fontenot said Thursday.
“Kirk is a great man, and he’s been great support for Mike. We are very comfortable moving forward with him as the backup.”
After turnover issues, the Falcons made the decision to bench Cousins officially going into week 16 against the Giants and turned to Michael Penix Jr. to lead the Atlanta offense for the final three regular season game.
Coming into the season, after Atlanta signed Kirk Cousin for $180 million to pilot the Falcons just weeks before drafting Penix in the first round after his magical run with University of Washington.
The sequence of moves left a lot of Falcons fans scratching their heads. While either one set alone would be great for a Falcons team who has been thirsting for a productive quarterback ever since the front office “let” Matt Ryan go to the Colts…Still not over that. The rub came with the question of “why both?”
The Falcons plan for this marriage was, at least publicly, was for Cousins to navigate the Falcons for two seasons while mentoring Michael Penix Jr. When the turnover woes came into play, the timeline was expedited by well over a year.
Terry Fontenot also told the media that the Falcons signed Cousins expecting to see a “high-level quarterback play for two years.” The Atlanta GM would go on to say, “the plan was for Kirk to play longer and for Mike to sit longer.”
Now the question comes into play of while the Falcons are “comfortable” with Cousins continuing the mentorship part of the plan and serving as the backup quarterback, is Cousins comfortable with the new plan?
Cousins showed flashes of still being a really good quarterback in the NFL, thinking back to his record setting 509 yards passing in an overtime win against Tampa Bay.
Folks also thought this was a match made in heaven with back-to-back wins against the Cowboys and Buccaneers for a second time, but that was the pinnacle of the season for Cousins.
After that stretch, the final five starts for the former Viking turned into throwing one touchdown and nine interceptions which would tie the NFL lead for the season with sixteen picks.
Especially after the Netflix Documentary “Quarterback” a few years ago, Cousins has been a fan favorite for his personality and leadership qualities everywhere he’s been, especially in his time with Minnesota, and that’s no different in Atlanta.
While a well-established NFL quarterback very easily could have turned the relationship sour after being benched in year one, Fontenot alluded to that being far from this situation, “Kirk is a great man, and he’s been great support for Mike. We are very comfortable moving forward with him as the backup.”
This is one, I’m torn. From the Falcons perspective, it would be awesome for Cousins to be essentially a second QB coach for Atlanta and mentor Michael Penix Jr. as he begins what the Birds believe is a long and successful career.
On the flip side, I also think Cousins has a lot to give to a team and could be a crucial factor going forward.
Bugs In The System
By: Colin Lacy
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
Just into the change of the calendar from 2024 to 2025, the first 12-team College Football Playoff has completed the first two rounds of the bracket.
Not that it surprises many folks, but the playoff format is already drawing grumblings from college football coaches, media, and fans alike.
Now that we’ve seen the first round, on-campus sites, and the quarterfinals round in four of the New Years Six Games, what have we learned and where should this go in the future?
To find out what we’ve learned, we must look back and see how we got here. The birth of the College Football Playoff began for the 2014 season and was formed as a four-team playoff for the National Championship until this season (2024) when the expansion to 12-teams took effect.
The expansion talks have been just that since the inception of the CFP but took some weight when an internal working group of ADs, Commissioners and former coaches/players was put into place in June of 2021.
That group was tasked with exploring what a format of an expanded playoff would look like in the future.
Fast forward a year and a half to December of 2022, the CFP Board of Managers unanimously agrees to implement the 12-team playoff beginning in the 2024 and 2025 seasons.
The part that severely went unnoticed in the expediency of the format change is that the working group was given a target date of beginning the format in the 2025 season.
SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey, who was in that working group, has publicly said that when the start date was moved up a full year, they knew there were going to be some bugs that needed to be worked out.
So, what are those bugs that have reared their ugly head so far through eight games in the CFP?
Going into the first round, outside of fans in Tuscaloosa and an SEC Head Coach that calls Oxford, Mississippi home, the majority of fans and media do not have many bones to pick with the 12-teams that are in the playoff, but questions have been raised about the selection process after the opening round.
Getting through the first round of on-campus hosted games felt like a chore with only one game ending within ten points. No matter the format, no matter the number of teams, and even with a flawless system there are always going to be conversations of “snubs” or “non-deserving” teams, so that’s not the elephant in the room.
The biggest issue we have with the current 12-team format is the seeding.
One of the cornerstones of this format was the emphasis on Conference Champions that would have the five highest rated conference champions in the final CFP rankings would automatically earn a spot in the field, and the four highest would earn a top four seed.
This year that plays out as the Big 10 Champion Oregon receiving the #1 seed, SEC Champion Georgia earning the #2 Seed, the Mountain West Champ Boise State as the #3 seed as the group of five representative, and Big 12 Winner Arizona State rounding out the group with first round byes as the #4 seed. The ACC champion Clemson was the 5th highest ranked conference champ and rounded out the field as the #12 seed.
The big rub has been the seeding of the conference champions with Boise State and Arizona State, while being deserving of being in the field due to winning their conference, a first round bye (which turns out didn’t fair so well for any of the four that earned it this year) shouldn’t have been in the cards for the Broncos or Sun Devils.
Discussions have already started at the top (SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey seems to always have that kind of pull) in order to not only change the seeding but also begin developing a system to re-seed after each round.
I suspect that even possibly as early as next year, we see the five highest ranked conference champions receive a slot in the 12-team playoff but are not guaranteed a top 4 seed and first round bye.
After this first cycle of the playoff that runs with the contract that runs out after the 2025 season playoffs, do not be surprised to see re-seeding come into play after each round similar to the NFL playoffs. This would put the highest remaining seed after each round facing the lowest remaining seed and so on.
At the end of the day, this process was rushed to get it online and while it is turned into a couple enticing games and fantastic environments for the first ever on-campus playoff games, there are still changes to be made to get it where it needs to be.
My biggest concern in the process is the impatience of folks forcing the hand to expand to 16 or beyond before the kinks are fully worked out with the 12-team format. Only time will tell.
Splashless
By: Colin Lacy
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
After what most Braves fans see as a 2024 Braves season that didn’t meet expectations, Alex Anthopolous was expected to make a splash this offseason to bolster the roster, but up until this point in late December, there has barely been a ripple, let alone a splash.
Most of the news involving the Braves coming across your ticker has been now former Bravos now donning a new uniform going forward.
The biggest subtraction from the Atlanta club is one that most suspected would not be back in the 404 after not landing on an extension prior to the 2024 season, but came to fruition in mid-December when Max Fried signed an eight-year contract with the Yankees.
Other departures include Travis d’Arnaud team option not exercised and promptly signing a two year deal with the Angels.
There have been some pens to paper to add to the Braves clubhouse, but most would fly under the radar for the casual Braves fan.
The most recent coming on December 20th with the Braves trading for RHP Davis Daniel with the Angles and sending minor league lefty hurler Mitch Farris to Anaheim.
Daniel was born in Atlanta and was a seventh-round selection out of Auburn. The former Tiger made his major league debut in 2023 with three appearances out of the Angels bullpen and put up a 2.19 ERA in the short debut season.
With experience in both the back end of the Angels rotation last year and out of the bullpen, Daniel gives the Braves options on how he is used and what the best path looks like for the partnership.
The only other addition to note (if you want to call it that) is signing outfielder Bryan De La Cruz to a one-year non-guaranteed deal.
The past few years haven’t worked out for De La Cruz. In 2024, De La Cruz started the season with the Marlins and fell victim to the Miami Fire Sale in late July when he was traded to Pittsburgh for a pair of prospects.
After 44 games with the Pirates, De La Cruz was non-tendered by the club after just a .200 average and three homers.
There are a couple of bright spots in this somewhat head-scratching signing for the Braves. While Atlanta fans can hope for another rejuvenating season that the Braves development staff have done in the past, the biggest plus to this signing is options.
De La Cruz is a young player at 27 years old and still has options to be used, so if he doesn’t make the team out of spring, he can be sent to Gwinnett as depth.
Because of not exercising d’Arnaud’s $8 million option and re-working the contracts of Renaldo Lopez and Aaron Bummer to a lower dollar amount than anticipated, the Braves have some money to play with to go after that “splash” that has been hoped for since September.
Anthopolous said early in the off-season that he wouldn’t be deterred by the higher penalties (higher taxes with competitive balance tax thresholds) in order to go out and sign someone that could really help the club, but now the question is what’s the priority?
You can argue if the priority should be a bat in the outfield or help in the rotation or a key bullpen arm.
To me, the lineup should be mark number one. As hot and cold as the offense was last season, they seemed to be missing a solid bat in the middle of the order to be consistent all season long.
You find that, in a way, it takes the stress off the pitching staff both on the rotation and the pen. Now… just have to find it.
Flying To Bowl
By: Colin Lacy
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
While 2024 didn’t end in a Sun Belt Conference crown like the Eagles were still fighting for just a few short weeks ago, Georgia Southern finished the 2024 regular season 8-4 and have been invited to the Big Easy for the R&L Carriers New Orleans Bowl in the Caesars Superdome on December 19th to face the C-USA’s Sam Houston State Bearkats who will make their first FBS Bowl appearance in their second season at the FBS level.
Georgia Southern will appear in their 7th appearance in a postseason bowl game since moving up to the FBS in the 2014 season.
Because of the NCAA rules on transitioning teams, Georgia Southern couldn’t participate in a bowl in 2014, but set the standard straight in the first-year bowl eligible with a dominating win over Bowling Green in the 2015 GoDaddy Bowl in Mobile to the tune of 57-27.
The Eagles are 3-3 in the previous bowl matchups and have come up short in the last two meetings (Last year falling 41-21 to Ohio in the Myrtle Beach Bowl and 2022 to Buffalo in the Camellia Bowl 23-21). The last triumph in the post season for the Blue and White came…in the same bowl game they’re heading to this season.
The 2020 season was capped off with a convincing 38-3 victory over Louisiana Tech in the R&L Carriers New Orleans Bowl.
Shai Werts was named MVP for his efforts in the Big Easy running for three touchdowns while the Eagle defense amassed four interceptions of the Bulldogs to capture the New Orleans Bowl title under then Head Coach Chad Lunsford.
Since that 2020 NOLA Bowl, the landscape of college football has changed drastically and now the biggest question going into any bowl game outside of the College Football Playoff is… Who is actually playing in the game?
Because of the Transfer Portal window opening a week before Bowl Season officially starts (this year it opened Monday the 9th), most teams are being gutted with players entering the transfer portal and opting out of the game.
Luckily for Georgia Southern, the Eagles have been one of the least affected teams in the country by the portal to this point with only three players entering the portal. Wideout DeAndre Buchannon, defensive back Deontre Morris, along with quarterback Dexter Williams II (who decided to fore-go the last few games of the season to enter the portal) are the only casualties Georgia Southern has seen decide to elect for free agency…. I mean the portal.
On the flip side, Sam Houston State has been slapped across the face by the portal. Eighteen Bearkats have decided to look for greener pastures in the portal including virtually the entire running back room with the only four running backs with a carry on the season entering their name into the transfer jar including DJ McKinney who was named C-USA Freshman of the Year.
The Bearkats also have seen eleven players that have played a factor (not all starters) on defense this year have also joined the list. With all of that said, the decision hasn’t been made yet of how many of them still play in the Bowl game despite being in the portal. Each team decides how to handle that scenario where some coaches will, and some won’t allow someone in the portal to still play for that school. Indications are that at least some (again no idea how many) will suit up against the Blue and White.
In addition to all of the portal departures, Sam Houston State is battling through also losing their head coach, K.C. Keeler who was hired as the next head coach at Temple on December 1st. Keeler had spearheaded Sam Houston in their transition from the FCS to FBS and after eleven years in Huntsville, Keeler hands the reigns off to Interim Head Coach Brad Cornelsen who was the Offensive Coordinator for Keeler the past two years.
So, while stability is the name of the game for Georgia Southern in the meantime, there are a lot of unanswered questions on the scouting report for the Bearkats. We have seen magical moments in the Bowl Season for Georgia Southern many times and can’t wait to see what this one turns out to be in the Big Easy for Big Blue!
Becoming A Legend
By: Colin Lacy
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
The air on Friday nights gets a little cooler…time change makes the sun set a little earlier; it must mean it’s time for postseason football in South Georgia.
Although the GISA has gotten a jump on the postseason party a few weeks prior to the GHSA, Southeast Bulloch Football is poised to return to the postseason for the first time since 2021.
Although there’s a ton of factors in the success for the Jackets in 2024, there’s one that seems we have said over the airwaves repeatedly and has racked up a historic season in Brooklet…Colby Smith.
On the first weekend in November, Colby Smith eclipsed the 1,000-yard rushing mark for the season becoming the first Jacket in seven years to run for more than 1K in a year.
With a 36 yard second quarter rush against Beach, the junior running back became the first SEB rusher since Chase Walker in 2017 to reach the 1,000-yard echelon, which lends itself to pretty good company.
Chase Walker is one of the most decorated players to come through Brooklet with a stellar high school career from 2014-2017 playing under three head coaches in his four-year span of Pat Collins, Steve Pennington, and Barrett Davis.
Walker not only surpassed 1,000 rushing yards as a senior in 2017 but did it in all four years as a Yellow Jacket and racked up 6,100 career yards on the ground with 28 career 100-yard rushing games.
Walker also found the endzone 91 times for rushing touchdowns, which still ranks top 15 on the all-time state of Georgia record book. To put it in perspective, Herschel Walker (regarded as one of the best players out of the state) sits 3 spots behind Walker on the all-time career rushing touchdowns list with 86.
Colby Smith has been a massive impact for Southeast Bulloch on both sides of the ball virtually his entire career. He will wrap the 2024 regular season with his 27th game played and 25th career game started.
Smith was thrust on the scene as a freshman in 2022 and started the back half of the season as a linebacker for the Jackets.
Over the last four years, Smith has seen considerable action at linebacker, safety, nickel, running back and was the backup quarterback last season and was thrown in the fire after Will Nelson’s injury.
“He’s just a hard-nosed kid,” said SEB Head Coach Jared Zito. “He physical and he’s super smart, but what gets overlooked is his athleticism and the kind of athlete he is. He’s got incredible balance, great vision, tremendous feet and is MUCH faster than people think.”
Smith has the old school football player feeling around him, and a lot of that comes from his family.
His family is one that loves the Jackets and is the picture of what a football family is.
There is not a game or event that goes by that doesn’t have his dad Cameron (who is part of the chain crew on the sidelines for the home games), his mom, Christy, and sister Courtney.
It goes beyond that too. Colby’s cousins Matt Bowen played, and Jason Bowen plays for the Jackets on the field with his Uncle Mark Bowen in the booth as an analyst on SEB’s radio broadcast on 106.5, the Boro and Aunt Christy Bowen who serves with the SEB Athletic Booster Club as the treasurer.
If that group isn’t enough, the icons of the squad that show up no matter where or the weather are his grandparents Larry and Charlotte Bowen, and when you hear someone yelling and cheering above everyone else…. it’s probably Mr. Larry.
It’s been a blast this year for me to get a front row seat to watch a historic season that Colby Smith has been putting up on the field, but the real root of high school football is the people that you get to spend each Friday night with, and it’s an absolute honor to get to see the person that Colby is and has around him.
Where’s The Game?
By: Colin Lacy
TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services
The “World’s Largest Cocktail Party” has become a staple in college football and the sports world for the game, the atmosphere, and the pageantry around one of (if not the single) best rivalries in College Football. Each year half of EverBank Stadium, Home to the NFL’s Jacksonville Jaguars is filled with red and black while half is filled with blue and orange.
Since 1933, all but two Georgia/Florida (or Florida/Georgia depending on which side you sit) matchups have taken place in Jacksonville. But the question raises…Why Jacksonville?
The only matchups since 1933 that haven’t taken place in Jacksonville were in 1994 & 1995 because the Gator Bowl had been demolished, and the (then) Jacksonville Municipal Stadium construction was still in progress as the ‘94 meeting moved to Gainesville & ’95 called Athens home.
1933 wasn’t the first time the two met in Jacksonville, as a matter of fact just the second all-time meeting came in Duval County in 1915.
Leading into the 1933 season, administrators from both schools had talked about moving the game to a neutral site, but where?
Florida Historian Norm Carlson said in an interview with Florida Football that transportation was the reason…
“They moved that game to Jacksonville in 1933 because fans of both schools could easily get there by train,” said Carlson in a 2016 interview. “It turned out right. The game was sold out the first year and from then on that was held in Jacksonville.”
That’s one reason, but if you ask ten historians, you may get ten different answers. So why else has this 80-year tradition stood?
You have to remember back in the early 1900s college football stadiums weren’t the cathedrals they are today, so it wasn’t out of the ordinary for rivalry games across the country to be held at a neutral site to allow for a larger crowd.
Georgia historian Loran Smith said in a 2023 interview with 11Alive in Atlanta, “ “Georgia had a rickety old baseball field which served as the football field. We played Georgia Tech in Atlanta every year for a number of years.”
There have been many conversations about moving this game over the years, but administrators from both sides still see the value of playing in the bigger city.
Jacksonville wasn’t the only neutral site for this game. The first ever meeting between the two took place in Macon while also seeing stops in Tampa (1919) and Savannah (1928 & 1930). Athens has hosted the game five times while Gainesville has only seen this matchup inside the city limits twice (1931 & 1994).
In recent years there has been some questions surrounding the Jaguars rebuilding EverBank Stadium and what would happen to this game, but all parties have an agreed to extend the option in the current contract and keep the game in Jacksonville until at least 2025.
While Georgia is still trying to prove it’s at the elite level in the game, and Florida is trying to get their program right, you can throw it all out the window. The World’s Largest Cocktail Party will be rocking in Duval County!
