A historical look at Georgia 5A Traditional State Champions

5A has a long history in Georgia … going back to 2001 when Starr’s Mill claimed the first Traditional title. McEachern would win the duals title the following and Collins Hill to the traditional title. From that point we’ve seen a number of different programs take home the crown … few of those early champions are still 5A in 2023-2024 and have been replaced in recent years by dominating runs from Cass, Woodland, and Jefferson. The most dominating run in 5A still belongs to Collins Hill who won 4 consecutive duals titles from 2008-2011 (and 5 consecutive traditional titles from 2008-2012). Because of the dominance of some programs in recent years … we see quite a few recent dates below (2020’s and then much older dates taking us back to before the turn of the century). Below are the most recent state champions of the current 5A programs (keep in mind that the individuals were not necessarily individual 5A State Champions … this is a look at the current 5A programs and their last champion).

Let’s take a closer look at just a few of these names (no time to delve into all of them):

Brian St James became Centennial’s 3rd State Champion and their only 2x Champion in 2010. St James finished as a 3x finalist, losing in the 5A 112 lb. final before winning his first title in 5A 112 over Adam Wilson of Roswell in 2009 and again in 5A 119 lb. title over Wilson. St James finished his high school career with 109 consecutive wins.

Northgate high school had quite a run in the early 2000’s. Brad Dettmerring won their first title in 2001 followed by Justin Jordan in 2022 and then their first 2x State Champion in Paul Sanford in 2005 and 2007, but none matched the last Northgate champ - Tyler Askey. Askey is one of 48 4x State Champions in Georgia History and one of very few to finish his high school unbeaten (194-0). Askey won his first State title in 2010 as a 140 lb. freshman over Robbie Collum of South Effingham. Askey would go onto compete at the University of Virginia from 2013-2017.

Askey isn’t the only 4x State Champion on the list above … he is joined by Union Grove’s Justin Ruffin. Union Grove has had 14 State Champions in their history with 3 2xers, but Ruffin is the only one to have 4 titles - winning his first in 2015 and his last in 2018 (and based on the graphic … the last one at Union Grove). He finished his high school career with a perfect 53-0 record and was 188-4 over 4 years at Union Grove. Ruffin went onto compete at SIUE and was a 3x NCAA Qualifier.

Roman Belardo, Chaz McDonald, Davis Dollar, Creed Thomas, Luke Cochran, Dallas Russell, and Sammy Brown each earned a state title for Jefferson in 2023. Seven individual champs in a single season is a rare feat and Jefferson need each one of them to hold off a strong run from Runner-up Cass. I haven’t looked it up yet, but 7 champs from a single school in 5A might be a state record. For a peek behind the scenes of the Jefferson program as well as Coach Baird’s discussion of winning 7 individual titles last year … watch the video below: