GAME OF THE WEEK: Houston County football starts region play against county and stadium rival Veterans on homecoming

The Houston County and Veterans rivalry has been anything but close the last three years, but given the Warhawks’ recent performances there’s potential for that to change this year as both teams open up region play on Freedom Field.

Here are a few things to note:

Recent history might be about to change

Houston County and Veterans have played every year since 2014, and have shared a stadium since 2016 after Freedom Field finished construction.

In that time the Bears lead the all-time series 9-2 and the game hasn’t seen a close final score in five years. In fact, the Warhawks haven’t even scored since 2022, and that was a 70-21 loss. Against HoCo head coach Jeremy Edwards they have been outscored 168-21.

But this year has been different for Veterans. They’ve only been blown out one time and have been in the position to win several of their games. By Week 3 they’d already won more games than in 2024.

They were tied with Perry at halftime, though three unanswered touchdowns lost them that game. They threatened to beat Warner Robins for the first time in series history on Friday but a late drive won the game for the Demons.

The defense has been competitive, and while HoCo is better than both Perry and Warner Robins, this game has potential to be much closer than in past years.

How healthy is the HoCo running room?

Veterans might be about to face a banged up running room for the second game in a row, depending on the health of Austin Stinson and Javien Durham.

Stinson was injured on his first carry of the season against Brookwood, and has taken some snaps in the last couple of games, but hasn’t returned to a full workload.

Edwards also mentioned after their win against Warner Robins that Durham was banged up, and that they would look to get healthy during their bye week.

But, how healthy are those two after a week of rest? HoCo’s hardest region games start after their second bye week against Coffee, Thomas County Central and Lee County. So don’t be surprised if they hold (mostly) Stinson and Durham to limited snaps.

Regardless of the status of those two, Veterans will have their hands full with Colin Anderson, who has lit up every opponent for big runs as he puts together a great senior season.

Through five games he’s got 61 carries and 624 yards for four touchdowns, and has rushed for more than 100 yards four times. That’s an astounding 10.2 yards per carry, and if he continues the trend, he will break free for at least one 50-plus yard play against Veterans.

Doing everything right

While Veterans’ finals have been much closer than years past, they still lost those games.

What set back the offense in particular was procedural penalties. False starts killed so many drives, and the only reason the Warhawks scored as much as they did was because Tylan Glover ran for 73- and 68-yard touchdowns. David Drake had to sneak a 45-yard field goal in because penalties derailed the drive and put them too far from the first down or the end zone.

Veterans constantly found themselves having to go 15 or 20 yards for a first down instead of 10. So while there have been some moral victories of losing not as bad as the year before, that’s not good enough for head coach Steven DeVoursney.

“We got to do a better job of coaching them and making sure they do the right things. We got to do everything right to have a shot to win, and we’re not doing that yet. Hopefully we can get that goal before the year’s over,” DeVoursney said.