The high school football playoffs begin this weekend, and Class 5A will kick off its postseason with 16 games spread across the state from Leesburg and Brunswick to Gainesville and Rome.
The 16 winners in the first of five rounds will advance to next weekend’s second round, with games played at the higher-seeded school. The playoffs will culminate with the championship game at 7 p.m. on Dec. 17 in Mercedes Benz Stadium.
Here’s a look at some of the storylines of the first round:
*Defending champions: Thanks to a GHSA reclassification cycle that was more drastic than usual, cutting from eight classifications to seven, there are three reigning state champions in the Class 5A field. Milton won the highest classification last year (7A) and dropped down this season. Coffee was the champion in the third-highest class (then 5A) and moved up. And Thomas County Central won the second-highest class (then 6A) and stayed put. Thomas County Central beat Coffee 38-7 in regular-season play this year.
*Favorites: Top-ranked Milton and No. 2 Lee County were the only Class 5A teams to make it through the regular season undefeated. Both are heavily favored by the computer Maxwell Ratings to win this week (Milton by 42 over Woodstock, Lee County by 54 over Habersham Central) and will continue to be favored as long as they survive. Only one will have a chance to reach the championship game, however, as both are on the same side of the bracket. They would meet in the semifinals. Milton and Lee County are the only two ranked teams on the right side of the bracket.
*Players to watch: Six players on Class 5A playoff teams are among the top 25 seniors from Georgia in the 247Sports Composite rankings. Lee County’s Ousmane Kromah is the leader of that group at No. 10. The Georgia-committed running back has rushed for 1,003 yards this season. Others on the list are Milton wide receiver C.J. Wiley (No. 11, committed to Georgia), Gainesville offensive lineman Alex Payne (No. 18, North Carolina), Rome linebacker Jaedon Harmon (No. 20, Tennessee), Thomas County Central defensive back Kendarius Reddick (No. 21, Southern Cal) and Houston County quarterback Antwann Hill (No. 24, Memphis).
*Best first-round game: Clarke Central of Region 8 is one of only two unranked region champions in Class 5A (Sprayberry is the other), and the Gladiators drew a first-round matchup against a Houston County team that finished fourth in the classification’s deepest region (Region 2) after spending much of the year ranked in the top 10. Houston County won first-round road games in each of the past two seasons before eventually losing to the state runners-up (Woodward Academy in the 2023 second round, Gainesville in the 2022 quarterfinals). Maxwell has projected Houston County as a five-point favorite.
*New faces: Nine teams are in the Class 5A field that did not make the playoffs last season. Tri-Cities, under second-year coach Rodney Hackney, ended the longest drought, reaching the postseason for the first time since 2012. Woodstock is back for the first time since 2017. Wolverines coach Dan Devine is 9-11 (7-3 this year) in two seasons at a school that had gone 0-20 in the two seasons before his arrival. Winder-Barrow last reached the playoffs in 2020. Back for the first time since 2021 are Jackson County, Lakeside-Evans, New Manchester, Newnan and Villa Rica. Clarke Central is back after missing out last season.
*Looking ahead: There are eight top-10 teams on the left side of the bracket, and they’ll go head to head next weekend if they survive the first round. Those potential matchups would be No. 7 Coffee at No. 8 Brunswick, No. 6 Gainesville at No. 10 Woodward Academy, No. 3 Thomas County Central at No. 9 Rome, and No. 5 Roswell at No. 4 Hughes. All are favored by Maxwell to advance to the second round, with the closest game expected to be Gainesville at Sequoyah (Gainesville is a 13-point favorite).
*The projections: The Maxwell Ratings are projecting that 13 of the 16 higher-seeded (home) teams will win their first-round games. The only road teams favored by the computer are Houston County (five-point favorite over Clarke Central), Coffee (26-point favorite over Jackson County) and Gainesville (13-point favorite over Sequoyah). Coffee and Gainesville are top-10 teams that fell to third-place finishes in the classification’s two toughest regions. Here are the computer’s complete picks for Class 5A:
Brunswick vs. Villa Rica -22
Coffee at Jackson County -26
Decatur vs. Dutchtown -11
East Paulding vs. Effingham Co. -7
Gainesville at Sequoyah -13
Houston County at Clarke Central -5
Hughes vs. Dunwoody -42
Lakeside, Evans vs. New Manchester -13
Lee County vs. Habersham Central -54
Milton vs. Woodstock -42
Newnan vs. Tri-Cities -21
Rome vs. Glynn Academy -26
Roswell vs. River Ridge -21
Sprayberry vs. Lanier -8
Thomas County Central vs. Winder-Barrow -43
Woodward Academy vs. Lovejoy -32
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