Football: Artificial turf just became the majority in 7A

Newnan's Drake Stadium will have artificial turf this fall along with Coweta County's other high schools Northgate and East Coweta.

Newnan's Drake Stadium will have artificial turf this fall along with Coweta County's other high schools Northgate and East Coweta.

Coweta County announced last week that its three high schools – Newnan, East Coweta and Northgate – will move forward on plans to have artificial turf on their football fields this fall. Cost will be $5.4 million and includes track and other renovations, according to The Newnan Times-Herald.

That follows news in January that five Cherokee County high schools – Cherokee, Creekview, Woodstock, River Ridge and Sequoyah – are moving to artificial turf for a cost of about $4.9 million. Etowah, the sixth Cherokee high school, is having its 9-year-old artificial turf replaced.

Those decisions are increasingly common the past 15 years, but the recent ones do mark a milestone in Class AAAAAAA football.

For the first time ever, most football teams in Georgia’s highest classification will have artificial turf fields.

It was 24-24 last fall. Now, it will be 28-20 in favor of fake grass. Only four of the eight turf newcomers in Coweta and Cherokee are in the highest classification, and Oconee County is smaller school district that recently announced a switch, so the trend is not limited to big schools. In fact, none of Gwinnett County’s 17 schools in the high class have artificial turf. If the worm ever turns there, grass will be nearly extinct among Georgia’s biggest schools. The only other holdouts in AAAAAAA are Marietta, Newton and Tift County.

The artificial conquest began in 2002 when McEachern of Cobb County became the first Georgia high school to make the move. In 2004, storied Valdosta rattled the ghosts of Cleveland Field and renovated Bazemore-Hyder Stadium, getting artificial turf in the process.

Roswell and Milton in 2005 became the first Fulton County schools to move to artificial turf, and the rest of the county schools were on board by 2008. Camden County joined the trend in 2007, then Lowndes in 2008, along with all of Forsyth County’s high schools. Cobb moved in 2010 to have all of its public high school football fields on artificial turf, leaving neighboring Cherokee behind.

"The last couple years, us and Woodstock have been at a little bit of a disadvantage with the other teams in our region," Cherokee coach Josh Shaw told the Marietta Daily Journal. "We have to cancel practice or change them up when it rains. You can't really make up for that. It throws things off. Now, we'll have options to make it work."

Class AAAAAAA’s 48 schools and their move to artificial turf, or their allegiance to grass.

Region 1 

Camden County - 2007

Colquitt County - 2010

Lowndes - 2008

Tift County - GRASS

Region 2 

Campbell - 2010

East Coweta - 2018

Newnan - 2018

Pebblebrook - 2010

Westlake - 2007

Wheeler - 2010

Region 3 

Hillgrove - 2011

Kennesaw Mountain - 2010

Marietta - GRASS

McEachern - 2002

North Cobb - 2011

North Paulding - 2014

Region 4 

Cherokee - 2018

Etowah - 2009

Lassiter - 2007

Roswell - 2005

Walton - 2010

Woodstock - 2018

Region 5 

Forsyth Central - 2008

Lambert - 2008

Milton - 2005

North Forsyth - 2008

South Forsyth - 2008

West Forsyth - 2008

Region 6 

Collins Hill - GRASS

Discovery - GRASS

Duluth - GRASS

Mill Creek - GRASS

Mountain View - GRASS

North Gwinnett - GRASS

Peachtree Ridge - GRASS

Region 7 

Berkmar - GRASS

Brookwood - GRASS

Central Gwinnett - GRASS

Lakeside-DeKalb - 2016*

Meadowcreek - GRASS

Norcross - GRASS

Parkview - GRASS

Region 8 

Archer - GRASS

Grayson - GRASS

Newton - GRASS

Rockdale County - 2015

Shiloh - GRASS

South Gwinnett – GRASS

*Adams Stadium, which got artificial turf in 2016, was Lakeside’s most common home field the past two seasons. Hallford Stadium in DeKalb County got artificial turf much sooner.