By: Kenneth Harrison

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

Georgia Tech played their spring game and Team Wreck ‘Em beat Swarm 20-19 in the White and Gold game.

Starting quarterback Haynes King played limited snaps in this game. I’m sure they wanted to make sure he stays healthy. King went 5-7 for 31 yards on the first drive for Team Swarm. The drive stalled so they had to punt.

Aidan Birr made a 47-yard field goal with 7:23 left in the first quarter to give Team Wreck ‘Em a 3-0 lead.

Wide receiver Zion Taylor had seven catches for 107 yards and 2 touchdowns. Bailey Stockton had six receptions for 107 yards.

QB Aaron Philo completed a 58-yard pass to Taylor and a 17-yard touchdown pass to Luke Harpring to put Swarm within one point. Philo’s game winning two-point conversion pass attempt was incomplete.

“It’s really about just staying patient, trusting the process and now I got the opportunity to go show my abilities and what I can do,” Taylor said of his day. “I just gotta make the most of it every time I get the chance.”

QB Graham Knowles threw a 34-yard touchdown pass to Taylor with 1:40 left in the game. That turned out to be the game winner.

King completed 9 of 12 passes for 66 yards. Philo was 19 of 34 passing for 275 yards, 1 touchdown and 2 interceptions. Knowles completed 11 of 20 passes for 133 yards, a touchdown and a pick.

“Today was a perfect example of why I think it’s important to play spring games,” Tech coach Brent Key said. “There’s a lot of reasons behind it from external, fans and student body and people around, but the importance is when you go out and scrimmage and you have people in the stands, it’s a different environment. You don’t know how you’re gonna scrimmage by the way you practice, necessarily. You hope you do.

“Then you don’t know how you’re gonna scrimmage in a stadium with people in it as opposed to a stadium that is empty. Everything we’re doing trying to shrink that gap between our preparation and playing in a game. This is another step toward that.”

Freshman running back J.P. Powell scored a 1-yard touchdown early in the second quarter to give Team Wreck ‘Em a 10-0 lead. That capped of an 11-play drive.

Junior running back Jamal Haynes only had one carry but he did throw a touchdown pass. Haynes led the Yellow Jackets in rushing last season with 944 yards, 9 TD’s and he averaged 5.6 yards per carry. In 2023 he had 1,059 yards and 7 scores.

King threw a pass to Haynes in the right flat and Haynes caught it on the 45 and tossed a pass to Taylor who caught it at the 10. He dragged a defender into the end zone.

“We’re trying to build depth at quarterback,” Key joked during the ESPN livestream after the play.

Said Haynes postgame: “We put it in (Friday). We just wanted to bring a little fun to the game. Luckily, I had a great receiver to track down the ball because that (throw) was a little duck.”

“This is a reward for the players, too,” Key added. “You go through 14 days of practice, and I promise you our practices are real practice now. That’s the thing about spring; you go through all those practices and there’s no real reward other than the spring game. The reward is you’re getting better. So, give them an opportunity to go out there and play and you wanna see guys have fun, too.”