Houston County football shuts out Northside to move to historic 7-0

WARNER ROBINS — Houston County is having what could end up being the best season in program history as they moved to a historic 7-0 after blanking Northside (0-7, 0-2 Region 2-5A) 48-0 on Friday at McConnell-Talbert Stadium.

The best start before this year was 6-0 in 2015 under Von Lassiter, also the Bears’ only region championship season.

Head coach Jeremy Edwards doesn’t take much stock in overall records or historic moments, though he was proud of his kids all the same after their first shutout since Sept. 28, 2024.

“It’s kind of cliche, but we take a 1-0 mentality type attitude when it comes to how we do things,” Edwards said. “But certainly I’m very proud of our team to be 7-0. I didn’t know that that was the first time, so that’s news to me. A lot of football to be played, I feel good about our team. We got to stay healthy, but I liked the way we played tonight.”

Turnovers galore

Although a 48-0 final on the way to 7-0 might make you think that the Bears played a flawless game, there were a ton of turnovers on both sides.

Sophomore quarterback Ryan Maxwell threw two interceptions, which was his total through six games heading into Friday, and HoCo fumbled once for a total of three turnovers on the night.

Northside had three first-half fumbles and four turnovers total, including one on a kickoff return. All of those takeaways gave the Bears the ball in Eagles territory and ensured two things: Northside’s offense got even less chances to make something happen and the defense had very little margin for error.

Maxwell’s first interception was an overthrow to J.T. Thomas in the end zone, with Northside defensive back Aamaury Fountain pulling that one down for the Eagles’ first takeaway of the night.

Maxwell came under pressure on the second, and as he got the ball away Briston Blasingame jumped the intended receiver and returned the ball to Northside’s 33-yard line.

“I thought we were a little sloppy in the first half. We told them that,” Edwards said. “[We] tried to come out in the second half and play our brand of football. Don’t look at the scoreboard, play one play at a time.”

The defense, again, came up with a big performance. They haven’t allowed more than 14 points since Week 2, and have allowed more than 20 points only twice. In their last four games the Bears have outscored their opponents 202-38.

That kind of defensive effort is what will give HoCo their best chance at a region championship since Edwards arrived, and he had more praise for his defense after the game.

“[The] defense is playing light out,” Edwards said. “Gave us a short field a lot of times causing turnovers…I’m extremely happy with the way that those guys were playing on that side of the ball. With energy and violence between the lines. I think we’re just gonna keep getting better.”

Remember this taste

There’s not much to be happy about being on the losing side of a 48-0 final.

Northside’s defense has kept them in ball games all season and been all around phenomenal.

Last week they only allowed two offensive touchdowns to Coffee, before that they held Peach County to 19 points.

But this week they ran in to a HoCo team that’s looking to make a lot of noise, and they gave up 48 points and were shut out for the first time since Nov. 1, 2024 against Veterans.

There’s one thing that head coach Daniel Williams wants his team to remember about this game:

“You take this taste and you understand what it is, and you know why you put yourself in that [situation],” Williams said. “We didn’t protect the football, we didn’t make tackles. That’s the reason why the game got out of hand early on. But you take these as learning experiences and ways to get better and just understand from it. What we gotta do, we gotta do the simple things.”

As they approach some of their toughest games against Lee County and Thomas County Central, Williams says that growing pains are a reality this year.

“Everybody in the state knows I got babies I’m playing with. So these babies just got to go through these growing pains, and we will bounce back and we will be better from these,” Williams said.

UP NEXT

Houston County and Northside will take next week off before restarting region play on Friday, October. 17. HoCo will host Coffee and Northside will travel down to Thomas County Central to start a two-game road trip, their only two games away from the MAC this season.