West Laurens fends off Windsor Forest, finishes as last team standing in 3-AAAA title race

Long after the crowds from senior and mass band night had dispersed, West Laurens head coach Kip Burdette and a handful of others remained on the field at The SHU, intently checking phones for updates that couldn’t come quickly enough from a matchup of two region rivals, playing a couple hours away, that would determine the rest of his team’s playoff destiny. 

The Raiders handled what was in their power to control Friday night by defeating Windsor Forest 22-12 to complete the regular season with a sixth victory, and make this their third-straight with a winning record. 

That they would advance was beyond the shadow of any doubt. But whether West Laurens would be at home, or traveling, for this coming week’s first round rested with the outcome of a back-and-forth final game for Harlem, with whom it shared the top spot in the region standings.

With no live stream available to watch, Burdette and others had to rely on play-by-play updates via MaxPreps that conveniently went silent late in the fourth quarter right after a New Hampstead touchdown to re-take the lead on the Bulldogs, who with a head-to-head tiebreaker would have to suffer a second region loss to be overtaken in first. 

After a drawn-out wait, word of the confirmed final score came in: The Phoenix had hung on to prevail 33-28, fittingly helping complete a revival of the Raiders’ bid for a second-straight region championship, and their fourth in school history. 

It will give West Laurens (6-4, 5-1 region 3-AAAA)  the 16th overall seed in the bracket, and one more home game coming up Saturday against Albany’s Westover Patriots. 

There were few besides Burdette and TV 35’s Jackson Locke, waiting patiently nearby to tape a postgame interview, and a radio crew in the booth upstairs about to do the same, left on campus to celebrate in-person. 

But the excitement would soon make its way out to the rest of the Raider nation, which went to bed happy at the end of a night that didn’t finish on the most encouraging note. 

“It feels good,” Burdette said. “It was a ho-hum kind of second half. We made a lot of mistakes, and played kind of poorly, so to get that news, it brightened my spirits a little bit.”

Friday’s finale followed a recent trend of strong starts, followed by shaky second halves, in home games that have seen only 13 out of West’s 79 total points go on the board after intermission. 

The Raiders once again coasted through the finish line after all but blowing the lid off the first two quarters, scoring points in all three phases to walk away with a 22-0 lead. 

But they were unable to increase it as some unconverted opportunities, and a Windsor Forest bounce-back to score twice, led to frustrations the rest of the way. 

Nagging penalties were frequent in erasing positive gains. West Laurens committed its first turnover in four games as a blindside sack resulted in a fumble late in the third period. Two subsequent drives ended on fourth downs. 

The Raiders would keep the game a bit out of the Knights’ reach, regardless. But to channel the immortal Skip Caray, a little insurance wouldn’t have hurt. 

“We’ve gotta play better at home,” Burdette said. “We got nothing in the second half, we gave up 12. Gotta play better.”

Windsor Forest hit a long pass for its first touchdown early in the third as quarterback and presumptive region player of the year Jayden Martin hit Gavin Johnson on a 48-yard strike. 

West denied the two-pointer to keep it a 16-point game, then did the same after another score on a long, drawn-out drive to bring it within 10 with 17 seconds to go, to rule out any last-minute danger.

But the finish made things a little too close for comfort, especially as the Knights drove through at least three fourth-down stop signs, including with goal to go on Jaimeer Duncan’s run from a yard out for the final TD. 

It was the type of performance you can’t help but be happy with, and for coaches, one that likely will turn out to be better upon further review than it seemed in the moment with a glass that was decidedly half-empty. 

“We put our defense in some bad situations,” Burdette said. “We turned it over one time. Too many costly penalties and that sort of thing that just got us out of manageable conversion downs. There were probably some bright spots when we looked at the film, but I don’t have a really good feeling right now.” 

Putting it away early… 

The first half had some shortcomings as well, when looking at the performance through a postseason lens. 

But West Laurens did well to take advantage of three short fields and a plague of Windsor Forest bad snaps that peaked early in the second quarter with a sequence of plays amounting to 16 points in under 40 seconds. 

Martin, who had creatively improvised with some previous ones that flew overhead to negate all or part of potential losses, got himself in trouble with a recovery-gone-wrong on the latest that was rolling around back near his own goal line. 

The junior couldn’t get a handle, and inadvertently bumped the ball further into the end zone, where he had to simply fall on it amid a flock of defenders to give the Raiders two on a safety. 

The following free kick went out of bounds, and West Laurens asked for a re-do that Jaden Stanley – back off a three-game injury hiatus – would return 56 untouched yards to the house. 

More special teams issues followed as the Raiders’ pooch kick back the other direction was muffed, and recovered by Stephen Odom. And a first-play shot off of play action hit money for Duggan Malone on a 31-yard pass to the right that found a leaping Jace Williams in the end zone. 

His rollout throw was out of reach on a two-point attempt that left the lead at 22-0. 

A great-looking opening drive sputtered and resulted in a first of back-to-back opening punts. 

The second, which did ultimately find the end zone after a blocked one set the Raiders up at the opposing 30, had a misfire early as a wide-open Jeremy Brownlee juggled and lost a sure touchdown pass at the 3. 

But West Laurens got some redemption only a few plays later, as Justin Blash danced past a defender on a twisting route into the end zone from 20 yards to open the scoring, and Brownlee the same with his recovery on the following kickoff, when a knuckling pop-up got mishandled by a Windsor Forest up man that quickly got drilled by a covering Tripp NeSmith to put the ball up for grabs. 

“Sometimes, some things happen,” Brownlee said. “You’ve just got to flush it down. It’s the next play, always the next play. And always expect greatness out of that very next play.” 

The opportunity, from an even better starting position at the Knights’ 23, would also come up empty on downs as a completion to the out-breaking Ezekiel Floyd a few plays later was measured just short of the first down stick. 

Punts were exchanged the rest of the way to break, and the Raiders passed on a late chance created by Ayden Moore’s sack to pin Martin and Windsor Forest deep on their own half of the field in the last 40 seconds. 

Blash, who showed off some elite moves on runs accounting for about 70 of his 93 yards rushing in the first quarter, helped get the offense off to the night’s confident start. 

“I knew that we needed it, again,” Blash said. “I knew what I had to do. That’s what I did, and I got the game started. There’s a couple things we need to tighten up on, but we’ll figure that out next week and come back better.” 

Malone was 4-of-8 for 53 yards. 

Maxx Chafin led the defense with eight and a half total tackles, one for loss and two sacks. Leroy Mack also got to the QB on one of his six. Nicholas Hester had two for loss among 7.5 total. 

For a second-straight year, West Laurens was kneeling out its last game of the regular season… this time, unknowingly, with another trophy presentation in its near future when everyone gets back to school on Monday. 

It may not have been the same type of storybook ending, but one that was fitting all the same for a 2026 Raider team that hasn’t been big on style points, but took another of the consistent steps forward along the upward trajectory that it’ll look to stay on in the playoffs. 

“I love my boys,” Brownlee said. “They work hard. They play hard. We’re just working. We just want to be better. And we get better every day.”