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It’s that time of year…

Pick whatever cliché you want, but this is the last week of the regular season. If you have the chance to win and move on, this is a week you put everything on the line for your town, the team, and the guy next to you whether it’s on the field or in the locker room.

There are those teams that will learn from what goes down this weekend- win or lose.
But, to think that 405 teams will be whittled down to 160 by Saturday night…

Everything gets accelerated from here…

My question for you: Who have been your surprises this year…? Let me know in the “comment” section below and your responses are in next week’s column…

As always, these five things are in no particular order… just what comes to mind…

First thing I know… Rodney Walker is almost there…

300 wins in the state of Georgia… he already has 300 wins since he told the Macon Telegraph newspaper he won two games in South Carolina as a 24-year-old coach, so he needs two more weeks worth of being on top for 300 here…

“I didn’t have any business being a head coach, but I was. It’s kind of funny, I took that job and I relied on Coach Pitts, I’d call Coach Pitts all the time and say ‘What am I supposed to do?’ ”

Here’s how Walker got to 298/300, our friends Frank and Ben have the highlights…
((HT: 13 WMAZ-TV))

Second thing I know… region 1-AA is at each other’s throats again…

Last week set up this week, but the same four teams will, probably, make their way as far as they all did last year. Fitzgerald took care of Brooks and Thomasville just squeaked past Cook. It looks like that may be the order for this year…

Here’s how it ended up that way heading into this Friday…
Friend of GPB, Robert Hydrick, is in the locker room… sorry, Locker Room…
((HT: WALB-TV Albany))

Third thing I know… Burke and Thomson is going to be one of the best games in the state this week- and all it does is decide a region title…

Friend of GPB, Chris Kane has a preview…
((HT: WJBF-TV Augusta))

Fourth thing I know… and this is where we are reminded about how fragile life is…
Two fronts… one close and one far away…

From our friends at the Georgia High School Football Daily…

An assistant coach for East Jackson High’s football team was killed in a one-car accident early Monday. Joel Conway, 34, was traveling to school on Highway 124 when his car turned over several times and hit two trees, the Jackson Herald Today and other media reported. Witnesses said Conway swerved to avoid hitting a deer. Conway was the team's defensive line coach in his first year at the school. Previously, he coached at Jackson County. He also was going to coach East Jackson's baseball team, the Jackson Herald Today reported. Conway is survived by a wife and 2-year-old son.

And, secondly, there’s a story I came across from my reading the wires around the hemisphere that is along the same vein, but has a turn form last week that should give us all pause and a chance to smile.

Almost two weeks ago, Grand Prairie Composite High in Alberta lost four players to a drunk driver in a car accident with a fifth player in a medically-induced coma. The Warriors went from funeral to practice and back for an entire week before electing to take the field in their sectional playoff…

Here’s what happened next, thanks to our friends at Global TV in Edmonton…

It reminds us what is important- over and over…

Fifth thing… blatant plug alert…

With the last week of the regular season front and center, GPB is all over it…

The web game is the one that decides it all in Region 1-5A: Colquitt and Valdosta- a heavyweight battle in any week of the year multiplied by idea of the last week of the regular season…

Got all that…???

Huge… huge… huge…

And not to be outdone, the TV side has Peachtree Ridge and North Gwinnett at Robinson…
Expect 10,000 screaming fans to figure out a one and a two seed…

Pregames start a little before 8PM on both sides…

Go catch a game this weekend and every weekend…
Play it safe, everyone… I’ll talk to you soon…