UPDATE: Bulldogs set to collide with Creekside

Published 2:30 pm Wednesday, September 11, 2024

(Editor’s note: This game has been rescheduled for Thursday night due to the threat of inclement weather. Kickoff is still 7:30 p.m. at Creekside.)

GMC Prep head football coach Gavin Tierce feels as though his team has been missing something in recent weeks, besides the starters out due to injury.

“I’ve felt like the last two weeks our physicality level has decreased,” he said Monday. “That’s one thing I felt like we were doing a great job of earlier, was being physical and being tough. The toughness aspect is still there, but I’ve not seen much physicality in practice and I’ve definitely not seen it the past two games.”

And so, the first-year head coach is prepared to respond accordingly.

“This week at practice is not going to be fun or easy,” said Tierce.

Tierce and his staff will need to walk the fine line between coaxing more physicality out of the players while also keeping more from getting hurt. Seven starters sat out last Friday’s 32-0 loss to visiting Taylor County in the persistent rain. One two-way starter may be coming back for this week’s bout at Creekside Christian Academy in McDonough, but another offensive tackle was likely lost to a shoulder injury sustained Friday.

The good news is 1-3 Creekside should present a more even opponent for the 0-4 Bulldogs, possibly the most even the team has seen up to this point.

“I think it will be a competitive football game,” Tierce said. “Creekside has about the same amount of kids out as we do. When I’m watching film, this is a game where I see us matching up very similarly at a lot of key positions. Now it’s just a matter of putting a good gameplan together and executing it.”

The Creekside Christian Cougars enter with their pro-style spread offense that’s averaging 16.7 points per game, though a bulk of the output came in a 35-7 season-opening win over Marietta’s Dominion Christian. Since then it’s been three consecutive losses, the last two by three and five points respectively.

Creekside and GMC Prep do not share any common opponents this season, but there has been one team of interest on the Cougars’ schedule in the early going. Their 52-6 loss on Aug. 23 was to Lakeview Academy of Gainesville, coached by former GMC Prep head man Lee Coleman. That win moved Coleman to 2-1 against Creekside as he saw them twice during his four-year tenure in Milledgeville. In both of those games played in 2020 and ‘21, the winner shut the opponent out with the Cougars taking the inaugural meeting 51-0 before the Bulldogs got their 46-0 revenge the following year.

GMC Prep is not in must-win territory yet. Those start coming into play with the beginning of the region schedule at Twiggs County Sept. 27. But a victory sure would be nice.

The Bulldogs will try for their first in Thursday’s 7:30 p.m. kick in McDonough.