George Walton Academy wrapped up its first unbeaten regular season in over two decades with an emphatic 41-21 road win over Bethlehem Christian Friday night.<\/p>\n
More importantly, it secured the Region 4-AAAA championship and a bye in the first round of the Georgia Independent Athletic Association state playoffs, which begin next Friday.<\/p>\n
The final power ratings are expected to be released on Sunday, which will determine the 10-team postseason bracket.<\/p>\n
In a physical and often chippy game, which featured 22 penalties for 255 yards, the Bulldogs used a bruising rushing attack to control the ball and the clock and wear down a battered Knights defense.<\/p>\n
George Walton ran 55 times for 280 yards, led by junior quarterback A.J. Dillard, who topped all rushers with 26 carries for 169 yards and two touchdowns. He added 97 yards passing and a touchdown throw.<\/p>\n
Senior running back Zach Wolf rushed 22 time for 113 and a touchdown.<\/p>\n
Leading 19-14 at the half, the Bulldogs fell behind for the first time this season, set up by a Ryan Shields interception of Dillard midway through the third quarter.<\/p>\n
Four plays later, BCA sophomore quarterback Harrison Goodwin connected receiver Sian John on a 10-yard touchdown pass, and Jamisen Craft\u2019s PAT put the Knights ahead 21-19.<\/p>\n
But the Bulldogs came right back, moving 61 yards in 10 plays. The key play was a 36-yard pass from Dillard to Jackson Wells. Three plays later, Wolf scored from two yards for what proved to be the winning points.<\/p>\n
From there, the Bulldogs added two more score, all on the ground, on an 11-yard Dillard run and a 1-yard Wolf run.<\/p>\n
The Bulldogs took the opening kickoff and drove 80 yards in just three plays. Dillard ran 39 yards on the first play of the game and then connected with Caleb Post on a 43-yard scoring pass.<\/p>\n
On its first possession, BCA drove 65 yards in 13 plays. But 35 of the yards were on penalties, including a roughing the kicker on a 36-yard field goal attempt.<\/p>\n
Given new life at the three, John, filling in for the injured Goodwin, ran over left tackle for a touchdown.<\/p>\n
A personal foul penalty on the PAT forced the Knights to kick off from their 20. Another personal foul on the return set GWA up at the BCA 41.<\/p>\n
From there, the Bulldogs scored in just six plays, sparked by a 23-yard pass from Dillard to Jackson Wells, who was stopped at the one. On the next play, Dillard burst up the middle for a score and the Will Vaughn point after made it 14-7.<\/p>\n
The Bulldogs added two more when they forced a three-and-out and the punt snap sailed over the BCA punter, who kicked the ball out of the back of the end zone for a safety.<\/p>\n
A 35-yard kick return by Post set the Bulldogs up at the BCA 37, and they moved all the way to the 10 before stalling. A 32-yard Vaughn field-goal attempt was wide left.<\/p>\n
The Knights took over at their own 20 and struck quickly on the arm of Goodwin, who completed a 46-yard screen pass to tight end Cru Choko and then dropped a perfectly thrown pass into the arms of John from 35-yards to make it 16-14.<\/p>\n
The Bulldogs took the kickoff and 55 yards, largely due to three 15-yard penalties on the Knights, before settling for a 36-yard Vaughn field goal at the buzzer to close out the half.<\/p>\n
GWA and BCA have shared the past four region titles, with the Bulldogs taking home the title in 2022 and the Knights winning in 2023 and 2024.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"George Walton Academy wrapped up its first unbeaten regular season in over two decades with an emphatic 41-21…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14627,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[153,155,154,11097],"class_list":["post-14626","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem-headlines","tag-bethlehem-news","tag-george_walton"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14626","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14626"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14626\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14627"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14626"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14626"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14626"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}