The region tournaments are a little over two weeks away and teams are looking to move up in the standings now to improve their seedings when the tournaments begin.

• Berry’s Nicole Degner, a Peachtree City resident, won the Friendship Invitational to help lead the Vikings to a third place finish at the meet. The No. 24 Vikings finished third from a 15-team field that included four nationally-ranked teams.

Whitewater High School will be hosting the NFL Punt, Pass & Kick competition this Saturday Sept. 23 from 9 a.m.-noon at Wildcat stadium. The program hosts four age divisions: 8/9, 10/11, 12/13 and 14/15. Boys and girls compete separately. The 2006-2007 NFL Pepsi Punt, Pass & Kick National Finals will be held in January 2007 at one of the Divisional Playoff games.

Fayette County (1-2) vs, Woodward Acad. (3-0)
Private school powerhouse WOODWARD ACADEMY will roll to victory. It is hard for Fayette County to compete with a school that recruits athletes.

Region play started for several high school teams last week and the results were not great for most of them.

Starr’s Mill (2-1) hosted Creekside (3-0) and lost 28-13. The Panthers fell behind early with Seminole quarterback Eric Berry rushing 74 yards for a touchdown on the third play of the game. On Starr’s Mill’s first drive of the game, the Panthers lost tailback Brandon Witta to a leg injury, which hurt their ground attack as they were already playing without Greg Davis. A terrible Creekside punt gave the Panthers ideal field position but they couldn’t convert it to any points due to some penalties. Berry scored his second touchdown of the game on a 31 yard run with 11 seconds remaining in the quarter.

Sandy Creek High School hosted the Sandy Creek Invitational on Saturday and the racing action was top-notch. In the championship boys division, Landmark Chrisitian finished first, beating Starr’s Mill by a point, despite the Panthers’ Austin Enriquez winning the race by a margin of over 30 seconds. McIntosh placed fourth in the race.

The Whitewater Wildcats are 2-2 in early region play after two solid victories last Tuesday night over Creekside and Riverdale. The two wins bring the Wildcats record to 11-6. The Wildcats are one win away from last year’s win total so things are looking up according to first year head coach Ben Thacker.

The softball season is secondary to the region tournament, which decides which teams will make the state playoffs, but seeding in the region tournament can make a big difference and that is why the games in the regular season are so important.

The third week of the college football season was called “Separation Saturday,” but none of the formerly local players took part in any of the day’s premier match-ups. Many did represent their schools on Saturday though. Here’s a rundown of how they did.

The questions on everybody's lips before this game were, how good is Creekside's Eric Berry and will Starr's Mill be able to stop him? The answers were very good and a little bit.

It is only the third week of the season but several of tonight’s games will have an impact on a team’s region standings and none may be more significant than......

Volleyball fans who were hoping for a match between Starr’s Mill and McIntosh in the Collins Hill Classic last weekend missed out. The Lady Panthers were seeded first in the gold division, while the Lady Chiefs were seeded second. Starr’s Mill made the tournament final by defeating Sandy Creek 25-21, 22-25, 15-12 and McIntosh missed making the final by falling to Mill Creek, 25-20, 18-25, 15-11. The Lady Panthers defeated Mill Creek for the title, 25-21, 25-18.

It’s hard to imagine, but there a group of children at a number of local elementary schools who show up early to exercise. Running clubs have become increasingly popular, which is not surprising in an area well-known for its numerous runners and triathletes, but the numbers can be surprising.

Nicole Degner led the host Berry College women’s cross country team to a win at the Southern States Athletic Conference meet on Saturday. Berry finished with a total of 25 points to eclipse second place Lee, which totaled 59 points.

Fayette Biking for Life (FBL), a cycling club based in Fayette County, invites the public to participate in a ride they are hosting in conjunction with the Tyrone Founders Day festivities on Saturday, September 16. Ride option distances are 44 miles, 16 miles, or 4 miles. The 4-mile ride is called the “fun ride” and is great for beginners or children.

In recognition of the 100th anniversary, sales associates and staff at Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage in Atlanta celebrated the 100th anniversary of the company’s founding by posing for a commemorative photo.

The Fayette Chapter of Women’s Council of Realtors (WCR) is among Gold Level winners of the organizations prestigious 2005 Chapter Excellence Awards program.

Shelley Morris, a life long resident of Fayette County, recently signed on as a new agent for Keller Williams Realty Professionals in Peachtree City. Keller Williams always strives to provide professional real estate services to the very best of their ability.

The Coldwell Banker Bullard Advantage School of Real Estate in partnership with Griffin Technical College will conduct the 75-hour course required by the Georgia Real Estate Commission for a person to take the state real estate salesperson’s licensing exam.

After blowouts in the first week, things got a little closer for the varsity football teams from Sandy Creek, Starr’s Mill and Whitewater.

In the Mercy Invitational at Our Lady of Mercy last Saturday, Whitewater’s girls placed fifth, while Our Lady of Mercy placed eighth.

Fayette County and Starr’s Mill’s varsity softball teams played in the Cherokee Invitational over the weekend.

The Lady Panthers went 5-1, getting wins over Union County (7-3), McEachern (8-0) on Friday before losing to Dade County 3-0 on Saturday morning. Starr’s Mill followed the loss with wins over Brookwood (2-0), Pace (5-3 in eight innings) and Sequoyah (2-1).

Last week, if you had “Carolina” in your team’s name, you lost, ouch and then some. North Carolina State’s football team dropped to number 25 in the national high school football standings. Now to the good stuff!

The second week of the college football season didn’t have as many big games as the first week for players who formerly played football in Fayette County, but the collegiate athletes continued to represent their school and their hometowns well.

What many had thought would be a high scoring affair was instead a defensive battle filled with bursts of tremendous offensive plays for both sides.

Steve Brown’s picks - 6-2 last week

• Fayette Co. (0-1) vs. Jonesboro (0-1)
What happened to Fayette County last week? Maybe it was the recent announcement of the SAT scores. They will step it up a notch this week, it’s FAYETTE COUNTY!

And they’re off.

Week one of the 2006 high school football season is over and the results were good for some and not so good for others.

The Whitewater softball team faced region opponents Starr’s Mill and Fayette County last week and then took on local rivals, the Sandy Creek Lady Patriots. The Lady Wildcats went 2-1, losing to Starr’s Mill 1-0, beating Fayette County 4-0 and defeating Sandy Creek 4-3 in extra innings.

The Whitewater Wildcats traveled to Lovett to challenge St. Francis and Lovett last Thursday evening and came back with one win and one loss making their record 6-4 overall.

The Whitewater girls placed eighth at Berry Invitational in the varsity division. Their top five runners were:
• Kasie Knapper, 16, 20:48