Prince Avenue Christian football breaks up its schedule into three “seasons.”
The first five games, all non-region competition, are usually out of state as they look for talent worthy of meeting at the line of scrimmage. Then comes a bye week.
The second five games are region competition, this year it was Class 2A-Region 8. The year before it was Class A-Division I. Then comes another bye.
The last — and hopefully — five games are the state playoffs. The Wolverines have a long-lasting streak in GHSA state playoff history. They’ve qualified every year since Mark Farriba was head coach in 2010, but they only started winning when current head coach Greg Vandagriff took over.
“What we try to do is, we tried to break the season into like, three different seasons,” Vandagriff explained. “Three different, five game seasons. Just because the non-region was going to be so challenging that we didn’t want to, you know, if it didn’t go great, like we were 0-5, we wanted to be able to mentally handle it.”
The Wolverines made it to the semifinals once with Farriba (2011), the same year he won his only region title with the program. Jeff Herron took over 2013-15 and won three straight region titles, making it to two quarterfinals and one semifinal in that time.
Vandagriff took over in 2016 and won his first region title that year, also advancing to the semifinals in the playoffs. They went to the semifinals in 2017 and 2018 and the second round in 2019 before the current streak they’re on got started.
In 2020, Vandagriff won the first state title with the program, also claiming his first of five straight region titles. Since then, he has gone on to win two consecutive state championships in 2022 and 2023 and they claimed runner-up in 2021.
They went completely undefeated in 2022 to win that GHSA honor and that streak lasted seven weeks into the 2023 season before Mary Persons got the better of them.
Vandagriff holds a 104-15 record in eight seasons, known for having one of the best quarterback rooms in the state between his son Brock Vandagriff, now at Kentucky, and Aaron Philo, the state passing yards leader now at Georgia Tech, rotating through.
Since the program started in 2005, Prince Avenue is 181-57-1 overall.
This year though, things started out a little bit different than years past. They fell to three different opponents, the most losses in a single season since 2019. And all of it happened in the first third of the season.
So, what happened?
“We thought the best we could do was 3-2,” Vandagriff continued. “We ended up 2-3, so we’re a little disappointed there, but the thing that mattered then was preparing for region.”
Prince Avenue has recently taken to traveling out of state to find competition. This semi-tradition started with Baylor in Chattanooga, Tenn., in 2022 and expanded to two other states in 2023, including Hammond in Columbia, S.C., and Pensacola Catholic in Florida. They also played Nashville Christian last year in Tennessee.
This year, they played Mallard Creek during Week 2 in Charlotte, N.C., and Westside during Week 5 in Anderson, S.C. Both games ended in losses.
“With the first three games, we won the first one and lost the second two,” Vandagriff said. “We’re in all the games that we lost, we had a chance to win (them all). Not that we should have won, but we could have won. There’s a little bit of a difference. To me, should have won means you beat yourself. Could have won means there were some things that went right for you.
“The biggest thing we realized was we needed to rotate our quarterbacks.”
Sophomore Ben Musser and senior Jake Bobo shared the quarterback slot, each 50-percent of what Philo was before them. Musser came in from Jefferson this season, while Bobo was in year two after transferring from North Oconee. Together, they combined for 133 completions on 218 attempts for 1,927 yards and 19 touchdowns.
“He’s a good leader,” Bobo said of Musser. “He’s smart. Really fast too, faster than me. He can throw it and he’s strong. Sure, I’m a little bit older, but he knows what he’s doing.”
“They’re definitely progressing a lot more than they were earlier this season,” sophomore wide receiver Hudson Hill said. “It is a big change from Philo, but I’m still comfortable with my quarterbacks.”
Region contests began Sept. 28. PACS moved up to 2A-Region 8 over the summer.
“We were going up from single A to double A, and we felt the non-region schedule would help us, and it has,” Vandagriff said. “The biggest thing in the region is you want to go 5-0 because it gives you the best set up for the playoffs.”
The Wolverines took care of that by defeating Hebron Christian, the only team on the schedule this year that they’ve previously played.
Now, they wait to see what happens. Because they’re a private school — all A-3A private schools will be lumped together for the playoffs this year — and they won a region title, they expect to have a bye in round one.
“One week at a time,” senior defensive lineman and Georgia Tech commit Christian Garrett said. “It’s time to really lock in and get the job done.”
