Baldwin football 2024 opens at FVSU
Apr. 14—First-year Baldwin High School head football coach Kevin Patterson announced to The Union-Recorder this week that spring football practice for the Braves starts May 1, a spring scrimmage against Washington County High will wrap things up on May 17, and the 2024 season opener will be the final game of a new first-year classic taking place at Ft. Valley State University on Aug. 16-17.
Patterson said the series of games at Ft. Valley State is essentially replacing a similar event the Macon Touchdown Club staged at Mercer University the past eight seasons. In January, the Macon Touchdown Club announced there would not be any games in August this year.
Baldwin High's opponent on Aug. 17 will be Perry High in a 6 p.m. kickoff. Perry is the reigning Class AAAA state champions and a former region opponent for the Braves. Perry is now in Region 1-AAAA while Baldwin was dropped down to Class AAA in the recent Georgia High School Association two-year reclassification.
On Aug. 16, Central High of Macon plays Dougherty of Albany, Southwest-Macon plays Macon County and Peach County plays Northeast-Macon. Prior to the Baldwin-Perry game on Aug. 17, Howard High and Westside meet in a battle of Macon rivals and Rutland of Macon plays Bleckley County.
From there, Baldwin has only one non-region game, and that will be at home against Northside High from Warner Robins.
The Braves' AAA region schedule consists of eight games against teams from either the Richmond-Columbia county area or other opponents from the Region 2-AAAA days that will end with the end of this school term.
The games alternate between home and away. Baldwin hosts Cross Creek on Sept. 6, then goes to Harlem High on Sept. 13. There will be a byes on Aug. 30 and Sept. 20, and then at home on Sept. 27 when West Laurens comes to Braves Stadium.
There are three road trips east on I-20, the second one being at the Academy of Richmond County on Oct. 4. Hephzibah will make that trip to Milledgeville on Oct. 11, then its back on the road for the Braves to play Aquinas on Oct. 18.
The regular season winds down to Westside High of Augusta playing at Braves Stadium Oct. 25, then Baldwin going to Macon's Thompson Stadium to play Howard High on Halloween.
