Watch the broadcast live here:

http://www.nfhsnetwork.com/events/ghsa/8240175783

My favorite time of the year.

Tonight, 192 teams still have the dream. 192 cities, towns or communities. From Ringgold to Savannah, Augusta to Columbus, Valdosta to Atlanta. Tonight, 192 teams begin down the road toward the Georgia Dome and the second weekend in December.

Tonight, I begin my coverage of the 2014 Georgia high school football playoffs in Suwanee, as the Roswell Hornets visit the Lambert Longhorns.

Roswell finished their regular season at 7-3 overall, 6-2 inside of region 5, in the 6A classification. They finished behind both Milton and Etowah and had to settle for the #3 seed. The Hornets outscored their opponents 313-256 (31-26 per game) this season. They were remarkably consistent, considering what we thought they would be coming into the year. The 2007 state champions had two separate three game winning streaks and led the region standings for most of the season.

In 2013, the North Fulton school started 2-1, that lone loss to Lambert, and eventually they found themselves at 4-3. They finished the season with 3 consecutive losses to fall out of playoff contention.

Although, I don’t suppose we should have been to surprised by their success this season; after all they were very close last year. The Hornets lost three, one possession games last year.

Head Coach John Ford has resurrected the program. Now in his second season, the Hornets are 11-9. In the two previous seasons they were 3-17.

The Hornets have three top shelf talents. Sophomore running back Shelden Evans has eclipsed the 1,400-yard mark, Senior wide receiver MeChane Slade is a top 20 receiver in the state and Junior Tre Lamar will be a top 50 national linebacker in 2016.

On the other side, Lambert is back in the playoffs for the fourth time in five full seasons of varsity football.

The Longhorns are 7-3 overall and finished 7-2 in region 6 in the 6A classification. They too are outscoring opponents: 271-152 overall, 27-15 per game. For the second consecutive year, the Forsyth County school started 1-3; and two of the losses were in the region (Centennial and Alpharetta). Since, they have won six straight and outscored opponents 178-55.

After a 1-3 start in 2013, they finished 6-5, losing to Brookwood in the opening round of state.

Head Coach Louis Daniel is in his first year at the helm of the program. He spent the last five years as the OC under program originator Sid Maxwell.

Lambert gets 67% of it’s offense on the ground. Trevor O’Brien will reach the 1,200-yard plateau tonight and four young men have at least 100-yards on the ground. Defensively, they feature a senior linebacker in AJ Schmimmelpfenning who has 93 tackles and 17.5 tackles for a loss.

This should be a quick ball game dominated by the running backs. The over/under on combined rushing attempts for both teams tonight is 75.