Houston County secures home playoff game, beats Lee County for first time in program history

WARNER ROBINS — There were a lot of firsts in Friday night’s lengthy regular season finale between Houston County (9-1, 4-1 Region 2-5A) and Lee County (7-3, 3-2 Region), a tense 34-28 final in favor of Jeremy Edwards and the Bears.

On Friday, Nov. 14 HoCo will host their first playoff game under Edwards after finishing second in the region. The Bears haven’t hosted a playoff game, or finished the regular season 9-1, since their region championship in 2015.

They’ve also never beaten Lee County until now dating back to the series’ start in 2010.

Three observations:

Mathis Magic

Senior M.J. Mathis had another headline-worthy performance in his final regular season game at Freedom Field.

Mathis was mostly shut out of last week’s loss to Thomas County Central, but he came back with a vengeance on some crucial catches, including two in the end zone.

On a night where tough defensive fronts and plentiful penalties kept both offenses from creating much, Mathis’ 40(ish)-yard catch to the Lee County 25-yard line helped open the game up.

Colin Anderson got one of the game’s first explosive plays with a 25-yard touchdown run, and a missed extra point put HoCo up 6-0 in the second.

About five minutes later is when Mathis brought down that reception, and on the very next play (after a roughing the passer penalty on the Trojans) quarterback Ryan Maxwell found Mathis at the end of a 12-yard strike for six more.

Mathis caught a 23-yard touchdown pass in the third and another bomb into Lee County territory to set up another HoCo score.

“I think he did great. I think he took it personal what happened at TCC,” Edwards said of his star wide out. “I think he felt like he could have played better, and he practiced really well. He put his head down, practiced, and went hard every day, every rep. The timing showed with him and Ryan tonight. They made some great touchdown throws and conversions, and I think the only way they could have stopped us throwing the ball was to hold our guys, and luckily we got those calls.”

Explosive plays

While the Bears did benefit from several explosive plays, they were a double-edged sword that nearly gave them a fatal wound. Lee County threw over the secondary multiple times to the point where HoCo had to make some personnel changes.

On the first drive of the game a Lee County receiver found himself several steps in front of the Bears’ defensive backs and he put the Trojans on HoCo’s 27-yard line.

The defense, who once again had a magnificent showing, got a fourth-down stop to prevent a score. But that was far from the last big passing play for Marcus Snipes Jr and the Lee County offense.

Snipes got a 31-yard pickup and a 33-yard touchdown pass to an absolutely wide open Jordan Bush on another drive to cut HoCo’s lead to 13-7.

Destin Bell had nothing but open field in front of him on his 47-yard touchdown reception. Bell also brought down a 57-yard toss to set up another Lee County score in the third.

Overall HoCo’s defense has performed extremely well this season, but the secondary has always been a weakness. Against Thomas County Central and Lee County specifically it’s been a big issue.

“Several of those came off of just flushing [Snipes] out of the pocket, which we do well, but we just weren’t able to execute on the scramble drill,” Edwards said. “They were able to get guys open and we cut guys loose, we made an adjustment with some personnel and it worked out for us in the end.”

Jerome Gregory was the adjustment. He’s listed at 5-foot-5 and 130 pounds, so he’s small, but he kept up with the Trojans’ receivers pretty well in his second-half snaps.

He was tested soon after he got on the field as Lee County targeted Ja’marion Arnold in the end zone, but Gregory got his hands in there and broke the pass up.

Edwards likes to go with the hot hand (at least with his running backs), so time will tell if Gregory ends up playing more snaps in the playoffs.

Starting behind the sticks

When you have the ball, you game plan for 1st-and-10, maybe 1st-and-20 a couple of times if you commit a penalty. The hope is that you can get some positive yardage on first or second down and give yourself a manageable distance in the later downs.

Both teams committed an inordinate amount of penalties and routinely spent time behind the sticks. Instead of hoping for positive yardage in the first down or two, they just tried to get back to the original line of scrimmage.

It’s an extreme example, but Lee County ended up on 4th-and-49 at one point in the game. That’s half the field!

Whether it was holding, unsportsmanlike conduct, offsides or a false start neither team could keep in the positive. That’s one reason those explosive plays were so critical — you need them when you’re facing 3rd-and-22 every other drive.

“One of the things that we track is turnovers, dropped balls, sacks and foolish penalties. We call it the 12% rule. Typically if you can get all of those in those categories, 12% or less [of your total plays] you got a very high likelihood of winning the game,” Edwards said. “For us as a tempo team, trying to get not behind the sticks, that was frustrating. It was self-inflicted on us, we got to hold our water sometimes.”

“I think these officials they do the best job they can,” he continued. “We don’t have replay and all those things [in high school], so people give them a lot of grief. I’m thankful that we have people that show up to do that, it’s a thankless job.”

UP NEXT

Houston County will host Creekview, the third place team from Region 6-6A, on Friday, Nov. 14. The Grizzlies have a 5-5 overall record and were 5-2 in their region.

Lee County will travel to Sprayberry, the region runner-up who finished with a 9-1 overall record and 6-1 region record.