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State title for GWA Bulldogs
Published December 4, 2009
ALBANY — After landing a stunning blow in August, George Walton Academy returned to southwest Georgia and delivered the knockout last Friday.
With brutal efficiency, the Bulldogs bullied host Deerfield-Windsor for a 42-24 win and returned to Monroe with the Georgia Independent School Association state football championship trophy.
It was GWA’s second victory over the Knights this season. Both games were in Albany and both times, Deerfield, the defending state champ, was ranked No. 1 in Class AAA.
If GWA shocked the GISA with its 16-6 win in the late-summer showdown, the Bulldogs floored the league by the ease in which they rolled over Deerfield last week.
“Our defense has done it all year,” said GWA head coach Don Williams. “But our offense really came around the last three or four weeks.”
The Bulldogs’ six touchdowns were the second largest scoring outburst of the season. During its four-game playoff run, GWA averaged 31 points a game, bettering by a touchdown and two-point conversion its 23-point regular-season average.
Meanwhile, the defense and special teams came up big in the postseason. The Bulldogs shutout Southland in round one, blocked an extra point to preserve a win over Stratford in the quarter-finals and made a fourth-quarter goal-line stand to hold off Tattnall in the semi-finals.
But they saved their best effort for last against the GISA’s most explosive offense, which was averaging 36 points a game, led by senior running back Tony Zenon, who had rushed for 2,142 and scored 26 touchdowns before Friday night.
But in between, he was easily overshadowed by GWA’s big-play trio, which ran over, around and through the Knights defense all night long.
Juniors Eric Dobbs, Justin Brown and Michael Peek combined for 279 yards on 36 carries.
Dobbs and Brown each had three touchdowns while Peek’s 49-yard scoring run was nullified by a holding call.
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