Baldwin High heads to Macon this Friday to face the Howard Huskies in the Braves’ first region game of the 2026 season.
Baldwin has been among GHSA Class AAAA’s top teams through the first month of the season, currently sitting at fourth in the GHSA’s Post Season Rankings (PSR), which is the system used to determine playoff teams and seeds nowadays. During its bye week, the Braves also jumped from 10th to ninth in The Atlanta-Journal Constitution’s GHSA 4A Top 10 poll.
The Braves remain undefeated after three games, with their latest win coming against Dublin two weeks ago.
Region 2-AAAA will be a very tough row to hoe for Baldwin, however. This looks like a vintage Peach County team. The Trojans (3-0) made easy work of Jones County a few weeks ago, winning 42-19. Another Region 2 opponent – Spalding County – also is 3-0 and currently ranked No. 8 in the PSR. Troup County likewise is 3-0, most recently winning 42-0 against Calhoun, which has won multiple state championships in AAA in recent years. The list keeps going. Mary Persons and Westside-Macon are both 2-1 and ranked 15th and 22nd in the PSR, respectively.
First things first, however, and that’s Howard. The Huskies opened the season with a 27-6 victory over Southwest, which remains winless. Howard then took two on the chin, losing 56-6 to Valdosta and 48-7 to Perry. Like Baldwin, Howard had a bye last Friday night.
The Braves have shown notable improvement on the defensive side of the football, while the Braves’ offense has remained as dominant as last year’s offense that scored 333 points, the fourth-most for a season in program history.
Howard has one of the country’s top safeties, Tashawn Poole, on its roster. Poole, a Florida State commit, is a top-100 national prospect, checking in at No. 64 in the 247Sports composite rankings. He’s also ranked as the sixth-best prospect in the state and the sixth-best safety prospect, nationally.
Poole, who has two interceptions through three games this season, was a problem for the Braves last season, totaling 112 all-purpose yards on offense, plus four solo tackles on defense.
“We have to know where Poole is at all times,” Baldwin head coach Kevin Patterson said. “He is very skilled; he is extremely fast; and he has ball skills to go along with his abilities.
“We will try to prepare like we do every week. Try to get the ball in our playmakers’ hands; we always want to figure out and attack them with what they don’t do well and things they struggle with. And we will try to put their defenders in conflict as much as possible. We have to make the right reads and take what the defense gives us.”
The Huskies’ offense will not be all that different from what the Braves have seen twice already this season. Howard runs the triple-option offense, similar to the wing-T that both Washington County and Dublin run.
“They are essentially a triple-option team, so they force you to play assignment football,” Patterson said. “They also have good athletes at the skill positions who can do good things with the ball in their hands. Everyone has to do their responsibility.”
A 1-0 start in region play is important for the Braves to have a realistic chance at winning the GHSA 4A Region 2 championship at the end of the season, and it starts with Howard. Patterson’s mentality is to go 1-0 every week, no matter the opponent.
“This week is all that matters,” he said. “Nothing else matters. Our goal is to do everything necessary to be 1-0 this week. We want to be 1-0 at the end of the week when the final horn sounds off on Friday night. We can only control the controllables, so our focus is Howard and doing everything we can to start region play with a ‘W’ so we can continue to build momentum and team confidence.”
The Braves and Huskies will kick off Friday at 7:30 p.m. at Thompson Stadium in Macon. Thompson Stadium is a very easy bus trip from Baldwin, entailing one right turn out of the high school and one right turn into the stadium on Shurling Drive.