The first rounds of the 2012-13 GHSA State Tournaments tip off tonight with a collection of pivotal matchups. In Class AAAAAA No. 1 Parkview will host No. 4-seed Wheeler, Hillgrove journey’s all the way to Valdosta, Langston Hughes will host Luella, and McEachern will host Colquitt County. The rest of the one seeds that will host tonight are Cherokee, North Gwinnett and Alcovy. All these teams enter “The Big Dance” on fire after earning their top seeds by claiming region titles this weekend.
Class AAAAA has some very interesting first-round matchups as well. Salem, which won the Region 8 title this weekend as the four seed, will host a capable Paulding County squad that will try and pull off the four-versus-one upset. Tucker will play at Osborne in another big first rounder. In the same Region 8 that crowned Salem champion, is a Flowery Branch team that stumbled all the way to a four seed after entering the region tournament as a favored No. 1 seed. A frustrated Flowery Branch will square off with Allatoona tonight, which skated to the Region 5 title. Surprise Region 6 tourney-winner Southwest DeKalb will host Sprayberry, No. 2 Kell will host Stephenson, and No. 3 Miller Grove will host Pope to sum up some of the AAAAA action.
In Class AAAA Jonesboro and Fayette County both get early tests after claiming one seeds with emotional region wins. Jonesboro takes on Cairo and Fayette County gets Eastside. Stephens County at LaGrange is another attractive matchup. Class AAA is more big-name programs that are colliding in the early action. Top seed Buford gets matched up with Woodward Academy, Blessed Trinity will face Dawson County and Douglass will travel to take on Savannah. Other teams rolling into Tuesday with plenty of momentum are North Oconee, St. Pius X, Chapel Hill, Beach, Sonoraville, Southwest Macon and Washington County which will all try to avoid being upset as top seeds.
Finally, in Class AA, the collection of matchups also sets the script for a drama-filled opening round. Westminster takes on Calhoun, Armuchee is at No. 1 Wesleyan, and Jefferson travels to Kendrick, all looking to pass their difficult first-round tests as underdogs. Some other key AA matchups are: defending champ Lovett at Model, Dade County at Greater Atlanta Christian, Early County at Taylor County and Westside-Augusta at Jeff Davis.
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