You can smell it in the air. 

No, not this late summer Georgia heatwave, rather the smell of the high school football season that’s just one week away from cranking up – which is just as hot of a ticket in Newton County as the temps have been lately. 

This year promises to be even hotter. 

Welcome to the 2019 Football Preview Magazine, brought to you by the sports department at The Covington News. It’s our third edition, and though some of the names and many of the stories and storylines will be different from the last two versions, the mission for this mag was the same. That is, to bring you the most comprehensive football preview of the Newton County football scene that you’ll find anywhere. 

Once again, our staff has gone through great pains to make sure our awesome readers and football fanatics are well prepared to cheer on your favorite teams for the 2019 season. 

Each year there always seems to be something new and unique that crafts our theme for us. For the 2019 campaign, we chose to focus on introducing the ‘NewTEN’ Top 10 performers – a list of the county’s 10 best football players, most likely to put Covington, Georgia on the high school football map. 

Our staff chose 10 of the county’s highest ranked recruits, or players we felt had the highest “recruitable” potential. All three of our county’s GHSA schools are represented, and we know there could be a case made for many more. We’re excited about this list, and the caliber of football talent represented. 

This year, we’re also taking you to our middle school and private school programs to get a behind-the-scenes look at how those schools are preparing for the season. And if you aren’t a print or digital subscriber to The Covington News, you’ll want to be before Friday. We’re adding a few cool digital touches to our football preview’s online edition – the kind of stuff you can’t get in the print version alone. 

Every year we try to push the envelope in a different way to provide you with unrivaled local sports coverage on the teams that matter to you most. We hope you enjoy what we’ve cooked up for you this year. 

Let me take the time to thank our team. I will say, without hesitation, that we have one of the best sports teams in Georgia. Being a smaller publication, we have to become masters of doing more with less, and I’m grateful to have a group of content creators that don’t mind embracing that challenge. 

Big shout out to the entire sports staff: Tyler Williams, Matthew Grimes, Michael Pope, Sydney Chacon, Anthony Banks, David Richardson, Jason Mussell, Bailey Stevens and Xavier Williams who all played some part in making this happen. 

Also, major thanks to our publisher Jackie Gutknecht for allowing us to run with our visions to do sports coverage at the highest level possible. We appreciate every business that’s placed an ad in this year’s edition. 

And last, but most definitely not least, our advertising team of Cynthia Warren and Sydney Chacon need to be lauded as well as circulation director Amanda Ellington. Without their tireless work, we wouldn’t have a magazine to speak of. 

Of course it is you, our readers whom we seek to please, and we hope you’ll be pleased with this year’s product. You’ve got a little less than a week to soak it all in before the lights come on at Sharp Stadium signaling the beginning of what should be another exciting season! 

So sit back and enjoy this year’s magazine, and we’ll see you under the Friday Night lights.