Dragons prepare for region title defense

Saturday marked the official beginning of football practice around the state of Georgia.

For the Jefferson Dragons, it marked the beginning of a new era for the 2008 8-AA region champs.

That’s because this season, the Dragons will work under the leadership of head coach T. McFerrin, a winner of over 300 high school football games as a coach.

McFerrin was announced in March to replace outgoing coach Bill Navas, who led the Dragons to an undefeated regular season in 2008, and 11-1 overall.

McFerrin has had nine undefeated regular seasons in his career, played in three state championship games and won one state championship.

Sixteen seniors are listed on the 2009 roster for the Dragons, including quarterback Darius Minor, J.J. Damons and Lucas Redd.

Jefferson will open their season with the traditional Jefferson-Commerce pairing, as the two rivals will take the to the field at Jefferson on August 28. It will be the second consecutive year that the teams have opened up their seasons against each other. Jefferson has won each pairing since 2006.

Last year, the Dragons won 35-14 at Commerce.

For more on this story, see Wednesday's edition of The Jackson Herald.