The NCC Crusaders stopped the two point attempt by the Georgia Force Homeschool football team with 1 second left to defeat the Georgia Force and become the 2007 GFL Champions. With the defeat, the winning streak of the Force ends as well. As they look to rebuild, head coach Scott Willis spoke with HSI about how they got this far.

Saying the force is with them would be an understatement. The Georgia Force High School football team has only lost four games in four years. The squad is comprised of players who are either homeschooled or who attend a Christian school without a football team.

The Georgia Force has gone 36-4 in the last four years and has won three state championships in the Georgia Football League. Last year the team played in the state championship game, but lost 21-19 to the NCC Crusaders.

“It’s been good football. We’ll be challenged next year. We’ve got a lot of young guys. I guess this year will be our rebuilding year,” Georgia Force head coach Scott Willis said. Willis is a former college athlete. He played football at Appalachian State, and has two daughters. He was not planning on being the head coach of the Force, but when he volunteered to “help out,” he was put in charge of it all.

The homeschool football team started four years ago. At that time, there were only two players and no coach. Once the team signed up Willis as head coach, he wanted to find an organization that would sponsor them. He was led to the Georgia Force arena football team. “I was put in touch with the Georgia Force CEO and he gave me the rights to use the Georgia Force logos,” Willis said. “They gave me all of their away jerseys.”

With the arena team sponsoring the GFHS, Willis just needed to find enough players to make a team. Through e-mails and a local newspaper story, Willis managed to sign up 22 players. Blake Coughlin was one of the first players to join the Force. “It doesn’t matter where I’m playing as long as I get to play,” Coughlin, the 17-year-old wide receiver and linebacker, said. He is being looked at by Samford University in Birmingham, AL to play football.
“I loved the place. I haven’t gotten offered any scholarships yet, but I came across it (Samford) because I was looking for a sports medicine school. I heard they had a new coach, so I thought maybe this was the place for me,” Coughlin said.

Before heading off to college in a year, Coughlin will keep playing with the Force. Willis and his team used a closed high school football stadium to play all of its games in 2002. That year the Force went 8-3. Now there are 63 players on the team’s roster and the GFHS has gone 28-1 in its last 29 games.

There are currently nine teams in the Georgia Football League, but Willis believes there will be 11 teams for next season. There are homeschool and Christian schools that play in the league. The GFHS has done well against its competition and although the team cannot play against any public high school teams, they can scrimmage against them.

According to the Georgia High School rules, homeschool teams cannot play games against public school teams. When the Force scrimmaged against a double-A high school team, they lost 22-6. However, with four minutes to go in the game, the score was 8-6. “They kept their starters in the whole game, and I didn’t,” Willis said.

The Force has definitely made improvements from their first year as a team. Now they hold all their practices at Old Norcross park and play all their games on Friday nights, just like the high schools, at George Pierce Park.
There also is a cheerleading squad, made up of 20 cheerleaders, and a marching band that was added last year.

“I’ve always told everybody that I want our program to be as much like high school football as possible,” Willis said. He has recruited large businesses to help support his team, just like the arena team. “The giving part of all this is phenomenal. The Georgia Force company donated the logos on our helmets from Georgia Force. The arena teams starts the first of March, so whenever they order their logos I get mine early,” Willis said. “We have a touchdown club that sells apparel and car flags and banners. We have the table set up at every game and sell all this.”

Traveling is a tricky aspect for the Force. If a game is far away, Willis will rent motor coaches. If the game is close, the team will caravan or meet there. All the games are within a one and a half hour mile radius. “If it’s a home game, we have Wendy’s after the game. They close at 10 p.m., but they bring the staff in at night and open up just for us,” Willis said. The head coach has sent two players to college to play at the next level. One player is at Greenville College in Illinois and the other is playing at Kentucky Christian College in Kentucky.Willis tells his players that it is more important to go to a small college and get playing time than to walk-on to a big university and never see the field. “As we’ve gone along the four years, we’ve learned how to better expose our players. Right now we have four players who are being recruited, and one of the four have already signed with a junior college,” Willis said.
He and his coaching staff recently participated in an expo at the Gwinnette County Civic Center to get their four players seen. “We try to get our name out there as much as possible to tell people we are a legitimate football team,” Willis said.

Andrew Long is a 17-year-old center for the Force. He said that before last season he was not planning on playing football in college. “A lot of smaller schools have started looking at us now. Because we have made a name for ourselves, I’d like to play,” Long said. Last year the Force had 11 seniors on their team. Next year there will be nine. The seniors handled some serious games last year, including two games in triple overtime, which they won.

Coughlin and Long both had a part to play in their team winning those games. Coughlin was the captain of the team last season. He said everyone on the team is close. “We are such a close family, especially the seniors from last year. Everybody is always positive and caring,” Coughlin said. Long added that the atmosphere of the team is the best part.
“With this team, it’s a lot more forgiving than playing in public school,” he said. Willis plays a big part of making his players feel welcome. Coaching is just his part-time job. By day, he works full-time for Citation Manufacturing. He has been there for 16 years, and the president of the company has let Willis work around his coaching schedule.
The team practices Monday, Tuesday and Thursday from 6 to 8:15 p.m. Willis’ oldest daughter, Bonnie, is a 23-year-old cheerleading coach and his 15-year-old daughter, Alexis, is a cheerleader for the Force. Alexis has been homeschooled since first grade.

“At first I was concerned about the social aspect, but now it’s the opposite. Homeschooling doesn’t take but two or three hours a day, but in public school you have to go to so many more classes,” Willis said. “We felt like we were called by God, and you are going to get that one-on-one time. We certainly felt that the social aspect does not hurt them. They learn at their own level.” The coaching staff has made it a point to look to God before every practice and game. “We pray before every game and every practice. During the games, it’s usually the coaches, but sometimes other people who pray,” Coughlin said. “We always pray for any injuries or problems on the team.” Long said the coaching staff and team are made up of great people. “The coaches and the friends make this experience great,” Long said. “Football is my passion.” HSI