By Michael A. Lough

The Sports Report

centralgasports@gmail.com

Adam Lord warned his team back in the summer.

Lord was beginning his third season in charge at Brentwood, and as is always the case, each year is different.

Southwest Georgia Warriors
9-3
Terrell Academy                   36-14
Southwest Georgia STEM 60-22
Deerfield-Windsor              8-28
Brookstone                            14-35
Calhoun County                    440
Brookwood                            40-3
Atkinson County                   30-50
Robert Toombs                     16-14
Trinity Christian                   48-0
Southland Academy             32-21
State playoffs
Gatewood                              30-18
Southland                              42-7
State championship games
2024 Lost 28-6 to Brentwood
2003 Lost 54-25 to Brentwood
1998 Beat Bulloch 27-26
1993 Beat Piedmont 28-8
1989 Beat Westwood 13-7, OT
1988 Beat Gatewood 42-14
1987 Beat Westfield 14-7
1972 Beat Samuel Elbert 56-16

Brentwood War Eagles
Trinity Christian                  21-0
Pinewood Christian             36-10
Georgia Military Prep         35-7
Lake Oconee                          43-0
Thomas Jefferson                  51-14
John Milledge                        28-31
Briarwood                              49-20
Edmund Burke                     35-7
Augusta Prep                         46-14
Gatewood                               48-14
State playoffs
Windsor                                 49-21
Briarwood                              42-14

State championship games
2024 Beat Southwest Georgia 28-6
2022 Lost 46-7 to Central Fellowship
2021 Beat Terrell 37-28
2020 Lost 34-14 to Gatewood
2009 Lost 17-14 to Memorial Day
2003 Beat Southwest Georgia 54-25
2002 Beat Tiftarea 14-9

His first summer was his first summer. The second one came after the War Eagles’ first losing season since 2016.

“I was very clear throughout summer,” Lord said. “I told them from the get-go. ‘Hey, listen, this is a totally different look. You're not coming off a 5-6. You're coming off state championship year, 11-1. We return a lot of guys. So in AA and the eyes of AA, you guys are going to be you're going to be favorites.’

The War Eagles would have more than names and numbers on the backs of their jerseys, they’d have a target.

No problem.

Brentwood has handled being the favorite like it’s just another year, rolling along to an 11-1 record and another state championship visit, this time at Mercer on Saturday afternoon but with Southwest Georgia on the other sideline for the second straight year.

Last year’s record and title were hoped for, but not necessarily expected. No so, in 2025.

Lord made sure the War Eagles understood what was coming.

“You need to accept it, you need to prepare yourself in that manner that we get the best every week,” was Lord’s point. “And more importantly, you need to figure out how to be at your best. Let's not let's not not worry about who we're playing, let’s worry about us being at our best.”

This year’s group will likely finish with the second-most points in program history with a shot at the top spot. The War Eagles are 38 points from a new No. 1 at 521 points.

The 152 points allowed in 12 games is the 11th fewest, sharing the total with 1995-96. The defense will certainly finish with a top-15 mark in that area.

And the 22-2 two-year mark is the best in program history, topping the 20-4 in 2020-21..t least the third-most points scored in program history.

Plus, the last time Brentwood repeated as state champs was in 2002-03, the third and fourth seasons of Brentwood legend and Lord predecessor Bert Brown.

Lord is experiencing a coaching rarity: The team he thought he had in August has turned out to be the team he has in November.

“They showed up all summer,” Lord said. “There were committed. I’ve got 11 seniors. Eight of those guys play substantial (snaps). And they have been there, and they knew what it takes, and they responded.”

The youth he had during that 5-6 first season in 2023 has stayed the course and stayed with the program.

“We were playing a JV team,” he said of 2023. “We weren’t bad. It wasn’t a bad football team, just young. And they took it on the chin for a year.”

The freshmen he plugs in now don’t play much like freshmen, and now the War Eagles are planting it on the chin.

Brentwood’s best player on offense is at quarterback and its best athlete is at running baco.

And both Baylor Cobb and Tristan Robinson are underclassmen, Cobb a junior and Robinson a sophomore.

“Any time your best player is your quarterback, I mean, he’s touching the ball every play,” Lord said. “Whether he’s handing the abll off or (passing), I know the right guys get the ball every play.”

Cobb has completed 62.9 percent of his passes for 1,342 yards, 21 touchdowns and only one interception. Robinson has carried 76 times for 777 yards and 12 touchdowns, while Cobb adds 10 TDs and is third with 424 yards.

The stats are nice and efficient, but not dazzling, for one reason.

“(Cobb) has really played a half in every game,” Lord said. “We’ve been up so bad, and I’m not one of those coaches. I want my horses to be healthy for next week.”

The same goes for Robinson. Lord has to remind him about the blowouts and limited snaps, that most No. 1 backs of his caliber would be around 2,000 yards with three times the carries.

Lord and his staff have made the right moves personnel-wise, perhaps unexpectedly. They lost senior ZJ Scott, perhaps their top offensive lineman, early in the John Milledge game to a broken leg.

Some shifting and multi-tasking, and the War Eagles up front are fine with guards Cordy Francis and Will Hodges, center Jackson Pittman, and tackles Kaiden Long and Tucker Hancock.

“The last two to three weeks, we have really started playing well on the offensive side because those guys have now gotten physical enough and they feel comfortable enough,” Lord said. “I think offensively we're at our best right now.”

Cobb and Robinson are among the two-way players.

“Actually this may be the best defense I've been around,” Lord said. “A lot of those guys returned.”

He noted linemen Wyatt and Austin Albright and Tucker Collins.

“All of them are kind of built the same,” Lord said. “They’re like wrestlers. Like, check the box on a state champion wrestler. Absolutely relentless.”

Sophomore Jacob Hooks leads with 5.5 tackles a game, and Cobb has a team-high three intereceptions.

Lord is fine if the finale comes down to a foot, the foot of Brayden Tyson.

“I have to say he’s the best kicker in the state, outside of the kid (Wade Register) at Trinity (Christian), the best punter,” Lord said.

Brentwood plays mostly underclassmen who don’t play like underclassmen. Taking over games gives Lord a chance to play even younger players, building dept now for the future.

And that helps keep those horses ready to go.

While the War Eagles will be fresh, they haven’t been tested much for four quarters. But Lord thinks Brentwood can handle it.

“I know at the end of the day, if we go over there and don’t turn theb all over, limit negative plays, and tackle, we’re going to be fine,” Lord said. “I told them yesterday, ‘The biggest thing for Saturday is to be a connected unit.

“ ‘When people walk out of there on Saturday, I want them to say one thing, I want them to say, ‘Man, that group right there was connected. They played together and they played hard.”

He hopes they’ll also call his team “state champs. Again.”