A little less than three years ago, Lee Shaw stunned the high school football community in Georgia. The only coach Flowery Branch ever had, who grew with the program, building it from an 0-10 team in its inaugural season to a perennial state contender 10 years on, was leaving. And not only was he leaving, he was leaving the now-stalwart Class AAAAA Falcons for Rabun County, a AA team that hadn’t reached the playoffs since 1998 and had a combined total of seven wins in the previous five seasons.
More compelling than conventional wisdom, though, is the call of home. Shaw graduated from Rabun County in 1985, still had family in the area. And having built one program from scratch, he was now pulled to “resurrect” one that was already close to his heart.
On that front, so far, so good. Rabun County will be headed back to the playoffs for the third straight year this fall and currently sits alone atop Region 8-AA with two games remaining in the regular season.
“We’re building momentum,” Shaw said. “We’ve been able to three-peat* for the first time in school history and that’s been big.
“We’ve got a couple of very tough games ahead, but we’ve put ourselves in position to hold on to first place. I’m just super proud of our kids and the way our community has stepped up and believed in us and what we’re doing from day one.”
*This will be the first time that Rabun County has advanced to the state playoffs in three straight seasons. The only other back-to-back-to-back postseason appearances in program history came in 1962-64 when the Wildcats lost in the region playoffs.
When Shaw returned to Rabun County, he came with what he calls “the blueprint,” steps for building a successful high school athletics program. It’s been honed over the course of his career, including a five-year stint at White County and a spell as an assistant at Rabun before he took over at Flowery Branch.
“You’ve got to have a great administration in place, and I knew that Rabun County had a great administration from the top down,” Shaw said. “The administration here has bought in, and that’s priority No. 1 on the blueprint. Then I had some great coaches who wanted to come up to Rabun County and be a part of it, and that’s been crucial. And I had some street credibility when I came in. The success we had at Flowery Branch gave us credibility when we got here, and we were able to get some kids in the weight room and we had a little success early, and from there it’s just caught fire.”
Shaw’s impact was immediately noticeable. The Wildcats, who hadn’t scored 40 points in a game in five years prior to his arrival, scored at least 42 four times in 2012. They won six games that year, eight games last year, and are sitting at 6-2 right now.
The one thing that has eluded the Wildcats is a playoff win. They’ll have a chance to rectify that this year, and an even better one if they can claim a top-two seed in the region. One more win would give them that; two more would bring the program its first region title since 1998 and only the second in school history.
“We’ve just been preaching to keep it real,” Shaw said. “The Union County game was not the game to end all games. It was a great game for us against a mountain rival, and we were able to beat a team that was undefeated and it put us in first place in the region, but we’ve still got Washington-Wilkes and Greene County, and they’re two of the top teams in the region.”
The win over Union County last week was in many ways a showcase for what Shaw’s teams have done well over the years: big-plays through the air, hard yards on the ground and timely defensive stops. Shaw is perhaps most well-known for the quarterbacks who have played under him. Including his sons, Jaybo (Georgia Tech) and Connor (South Carolina) four of his five signal callers at Flowery Branch signed scholarships with Division-I programs.
But Shaw comes from a triple-option background. He’s evolved from the double-slot, QB-under-center look, to the more modern shotgun spread concepts of today, but at his root exist a coach who knows the value of the running game.
Each year under Shaw, the ground game has become a bigger and bigger part of the Wildcats’ offense, going from 160 rushing yards per game in 2012 to 267 yards per game this year. A big part of that improvement has to do with personnel, namely Charlie Woerner.
The 6-foot-5, 225-pound junior with scholarship offers from Georgia and Alabama, among others, has been a starter since his freshman year. This year, he leads the Wildcats in rushing yards (890), rushing touchdowns (10), receiving yards (452), receiving touchdowns (4), and tackles (80). Against Union County he ran 27 times for 172 yards and two touchdowns, caught three passes for 43 yards, recorded 20 tackles and broke up two passes.
Shaw credits the emergence of his teammates for part of Woerner’s success, saying “the team has really grown around him, and that’s a good sign.”
“In the last couple of weeks we’ve really had some guys step up,” Shaw said.
Senior quarterback Colin Grant has emerged as the starter after missing last season with a knee injury and splitting time with freshman Bailey Foster early in the season. Last week, Grant had his best game yet, completing 14 of 20 for 257 yards and two touchdowns while rushing for 53 yards and another touchdown.
The Wildcats will likely need to call on a variety of weapons to get past defending region champs Washington-Wilkes this week. The Tigers (5-2, 2-1) have won the last two meetings between the schools by a combined total of 93-20. They were ranked as high as No. 2 in the state at one point this season, but have struggled at times, particularly on offense. Despite any troubles to move the ball, the Tigers have been stingy on defense. They’re yielding just 12 points per game and haven’t allowed an opponent to score more than 18 this year.
“To me, Washington-Wilkes is as deadly as they were last year,” Shaw said. ‘They’ve had some crucial turnovers, and teams have taken advantage, and they’ve stumbled a bit and not played the way they want to play, but they’ve got all the pieces in place to be great.
“The biggest thing for us is going to be going on the road in a hostile environment. We did that last year and had some trouble. Hopefully we’re a mature enough team to overcome that this year.”
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This week's top 10 schedule
1. Greater Atlanta Christian (7-0) vs. Holy Innocents'
2. Vidalia (7-0) vs. Bacon County
3. Lovett (5-2) at Wesleyan
4. Benedictine (5-2) vs. Groves
5. Thomasville (5-3) OFF
6. Fitzgerald (6-1) vs. Pelham
7. Lamar County (5-1-1) at Putnam County
8. Darlington (6-1) at Armuchee
9. Screven County (8-0) OFF
10. Macon County (5-2) at Northeast-Macon
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