ITG-SG Top 5’s of Week 15

JD King, our November cover athlete, had a monster of a game against Benedictine in the 2nd round of the playoffs. King’s legs did most of the work for the Purple Hurricanes offense, rushing for an astonishing 332 yards and 3 TDs. King has proven week after week that he is a force to be reckoned with, and we can expect him to continue racking up yards this week as Fitzgerald takes on Jefferson County.

Akiyie Bailey and the defense kept Colquitt County in the playoffs for another week in their state championship run. Colquitt struggled on the offensive side of the ball, but once their defense took the field in the 4th quarter,it was a differ. Bailey intercepted South Forsyth’s QB twice and ran one back for a TD.

Another name that is no stranger to our Top 5 is Dameon Pierce.  Pierce rushed for 214 yards and scored 2 TDs to give Bainbridge the edge over St. Pius who did not make it easy on them. Pierce has be a consistent runner all season long and has continued to show why he is a threat to any opponent he faces.

Jake Parker led the Valwood Valiants to their second state championship in 4 years. The QB completed 16 passes for 130 yards and 1 TD, leading the Valiants to a 28-26 victory over Deerfield-Windsor. Parker’s performance throughout the year has earned him All-Region honors, and he ends his high school career with stats of 125 of 217 passes for 1,738 yards with 15 TDs, and he also rushed for 722 yards and 10 TDs. Combined with the efforts of his senior teammates, the Valiants finished the year with only 2 blemishes on their road to the championship.

Clinch’s running backs, Zebulon Johnson and Shannon Young put a killing on the ground game against Johnson County. Both backs had over 100 yards and combined for 5 TDs in the 50-34 victory at Donald Tison Field. If the dynamic duo’s performance wasn’t enough to make you believer, another running back Charles McCelland rushed for 100 yards.

Now that we are deep into the playoffs, we are fortunate to have four out of our five top teams remain the same. The only changes that occurred were that one team moved up, two teams moved down, and a new team made their debut, all on the basis of our prediction of the likelihood that each team wins a championship.

Colquitt remains number 1 in our eyes, even with the struggle that they endured from South Forsyth. They survived with the help of their defense, led by Akiyie Bailey who picked off the South Forsyth’s QB twice and scored once. Colquitt’s defense intercepted South Forsyth 5 times, 4 times in the 4th quarter. Fitzgerald moves up to the number 2 spot after an impressive win over Benedictine (54-28), led by the legs of JD King. At the number 3 spot on the list is Bainbridge, who has been a powerhouse all season long. They found themselves on the verge of losing their first game of the season but bounced back with a 18-17 victory over St. Pius. The Clinch County Panthers running backs wreaked havoc on Johnson County; the three running backs rushed for over 100 yards each. And closing out the top 5 for this week is a newcomer, Irwin County. Irwin shut out Trion 21-0, earning them the final position in our Top 5 teams. We at ITG are rooting for an Irwin vs Clinch rematch for the single A Public title.

 * Our criteria is NOT creating hypothetical matchups amongst teams in an effort to crown a champion; that is settled on the field within each respective division, from A to AAAAAA. Since high school, unlike college, crowns multiple champions per year, our Top 5 is meant to highlight great teams who are excelling within their schedules, regardless of classification. It would be unreasonable and unfair to eliminate teams in lower classifications from our Top 5 simply because of that fact. We can only hold teams accountable to whether or not they are impressively performing against the teams that they are scheduled to play. In short, our criteria is based upon projecting performances and the likelihood of championships, regardless of classification.