Indians Fall in Season Opener at Gilmer
The Gilmer County Bobcats scored two 4th quarter touchdowns to clinch a back-and-forth affair and take a 43-28 win over Stephens County in the season opener Friday night in Ellijay.
Stephens County did not trail in the game until the 4th quarter. Branson Stowe threw two touchdown passes in the first half connecting on a 10-yard pass to Kaiden Harbin and 27-yard pass to Dallas Hague.
Gilmer’s Peyton Chancey four touchdowns in the game including a score with less than a minute to go in the 1st half to tie the score at 14, and an 8-yard run in the 4th quarter to extend the lead to 15.
Stowe also had a 45-yard touchdown run, and Hague added a 3-yard touchdown run for the Indians, now 0-1.
Stephens County Head Coach Thomas Flowers said the team must learn from this one.
“This is only going to be a loss if we don’t learn from it. This is game one. We have already learned a lot of lessons from this game, and I know that this group right here, this group that we have, the 2026 Stephens County Indians, we are going to come back to work on Monday, and I do believe in this group. We’re going to be tougher, we’re going to be more disciplined next week, and we’re going to have to be because now we play Habersham. A lot of uncharacteristic mistakes by us, and we just got to get back to work, that’s just bottom line. Just because we go off the road a little bit, doesn’t mean that we swerve into the other lane. We need to just ease on back into our lane, and keep this thing going.”
Stephens County will travel to Habersham Central next Friday night. The Raiders fell 51-3 at Hart County in their season opener.
Stephens County Farm Bureau Player of the Game…Kaiden Harbin
Hart EMC Lineman of the Game…Malachi Williamson
Chick-fil-A Sub of the Game…Ashton Winters
First Baptist Church Spirit Award…Andre Mungin