A new program knocking on the state championship door for the first time plays one a century old and who’s been on the doorstep for the last six years as the Archer Tigers play the Colquitt County Packers for the AAAAAA State Championship Saturday night at Georgia Dome.

In just its fifth full season of football, Archer has advanced to the state finals for the first time in program history. It has been a meteoric rise for Coach Andy Dyer’s Tigers from 13-18 Archer’s first three full seasons to 22-4 the last two.

Meantime the Packers, whose program started in 1913 as Moultrie High School and became Colquitt County in 1978, are looking for the second state title in school history having advanced to the state finals for the second time in the last five seasons and making six straight semi-final appearances under legendary Coach Rush Propst.

Propst gained national fame before arriving at Colquitt County as the Head Coach at Hoover High School where he won five Alabama state titles, played in seven total finals, was 108-15 in nine seasons and had the program featured on the MTV reality show “Two-A-Days.”

With the Packers, Propst has been nearly as successful, going 70-25 in this his seventh season and guiding the program to its second state championship game and the aforementioned six consecutive semi-final appearances. Prior to Propst, Colquitt County’s only real success had come under Coach Jim Hughes who led the program to the 1994 state championship and one other finals appearance in 1991. Before 1991, the Packers had only one double-digit win season in its first 79 years of football.

The 2014 Tigers have gotten better as the season has unfolded and the team has gotten healthy recovering from early season injuries. Archer has won 11 straight after starting the season 0-3 and have devastated the competition in the first four rounds of the state playoffs outscoring the opposition 202-55 including a 52-7 semi-final win over Etowah last Friday night. After scoring only 33 points in their 0-3 start, the Tigers have scored more than 33 points in nine of their 11 wins since including three straight playoff games of 52-plus points.

The 2014 Packers are 14-0 and have won 17 of their last 18 games with their only loss in over a year coming to eventual two-time state champion Norcross 14-9 in the 2013 state semi-finals. Colquitt County has also ripped thru their playoff competition although giving up more points than Archer. In their four post-season games, the Packers have outscored their opponents 202-97 including a 57-20 semi-final win against McEachern last Friday night. Colquitt County averages 46 points per game and six times have scored more than 52 and twice scored 62.

From a recruiting standpoint, Archer is the much deeper team and most of them are underclassmen. The Tigers biggest senior prospect is 247 Sports Composite 3-star and #33 TE Connor Redmond who is committed to South Carolina. In Archer’s junior class there’s 4-star and the nation’s #10 rated athlete Kyle Davis who is committed to South Carolina and plays WR for the Tigers; 3-star and #33 CB Dylan Singleton who has offers from Duke, South Carolina and Kentucky; and Rivals 3-star DT Kobe Smith who committed to N.C. State this month. Two of the brightest Archer stars can be found in the Tigers’ sophomore class in 4-star and #4 safety Isaiah Pryor whose offers include Georgia, Oklahoma and Tennessee; and 4-star and #9 athlete Jamyest Williams, who plays RB/CB for Archer and whose 11 offers include Georgia Tech, Clemson and Kentucky.

The Colquitt County prospects are led by 247 Sports Composite 3-star DE T.J. Smith who is committed to Vandy; 3-star OLB Quintin Hampton who is committed to UCF; Athlete Sihiem King, who plays RB for the Packers and named West Virginia his leader earlier this month; and junior WR Kiel Pollard whose five offers include Georgia Tech, Boston College and Purdue.

Join me along with Larry Smith, Jon Nelson and Grace Olson on the game call starting at 8:00 p.m. live from Georgia Dome on GPB.