Aside from Alcoa’s seemingly never-ending dynasty, definites are scarce in high school football. The closest thing our area has to a certainty is that at least one of the two traditional powers from the football-crazed county bordering Chattanooga to the west will end the season with a chance of adding more hardware to already loaded trophy cases.
Either Marion County or neighboring rival South Pittsburg — or both — have played for a state championship in 13 of the past 19 seasons, including five of the past six. Both teams have reached the BlueCross Bowl each of the past two seasons, and they are prohibitive favorites to finish at Finley Stadium again this December.
Traditionally, they have produced more all-time playoff wins (South Pitt has 105, Marion 73 and the next-closest school has 17 fewer), more appearances in state championship games (South Pitt has 16, Marion 11), and more all-state players than any other Chattanooga-area programs.
However, once the new TSSAA classification cycle begins next fall, both Marion and South Pitt will no longer be expected to ride roughshod over their respective classifications for the foreseeable future. That’s because a pair of Nashville powers are dropping down in class (East Nashville from 2A to 1A and Pearl Cohn from 4A to 2A) due to lower enrollment numbers, and will immediately take over as the favorites for the small-school classes.
South Pitt has won nine of its past 10 matchups with fellow Class 1A teams by the TSSAA’s 30-point mercy rule, and the Pirates have won 30 consecutive region games by an average margin of 57-8. All but two of their past 34 nonregion matchups have come against teams from a higher classification, so stepping up the level of competition is not new.