The Newton girls will open the 2025-26 basketball season as defending state champions for the first time in history after securing the title this weekend in Macon. It was the first-ever championship for the Lady Rams and introduces a new storyline now that its region counterpart Grayson and Newton have captured first-ever girls state championships in back-to-back seasons. The Grayson boys also won a first-ever basketball state title last season and the Newton boys came up just short this year with a runner-up finish after falling short to Wheeler. On the girls side, Newton and Grayson of course clashed in this year’s finals—marking their fourth meeting of the season—and have ignited a rivalry that has been lopsided for years. As a result, a new sense of excitement awaits next season with two matchups in the regular season guaranteed and then potential clashes in the region tournament and state playoffs.
Heading into Saturday’s finals, the Grayson girls had defeated Newton 13-straight times. The last time Newton topped Grayson was on Jan. 8 on the road 54-43 during the 2020-21 season. Grayson’s streak of 13-straight wins over Newton started after that. Grayson won 76-56 in the rematch later that season. In 2021-22, Grayson swept the Rams 52-42, 70-29 and 65-42. The 2022-23 season was Grayson’s second-straight sweep with them taking the games in lopsided blowouts 64-21, 71-36 and 62-23. Newton was just 3-22 overall during that season and the team went 0-10 in region play. Newton improved to 19-12 in 2023-24, but was swept for the third-straight year—including losses of 68-43, 75-33 and 62-39. It hardly felt like a rivalry at this point, but the drastic improvement from a 3-22 season to a 19-12 finish in one year showed Newton’s upward trend.
Grayson entered this season with 10-straight wins against its Region 4 counterpart and took the first meeting on Jan. 9 76-52. After that 24-point victory, Grayson added a 76-51 victory on Feb. 4. The teams met for a third time in the region championship and Grayson won 50-44—extending the win-streak to 13-straight against Newton. In Macon, Newton scored its biggest win in program history and turned a one-sided relationship into an official rivalry by triumphing in a 59-56 thriller.
The familiarity is there with the Grayson and Newton boys as well and their rivalry has been much more competitive over this time frame although Grayson has now won eight-straight against Newton heading into this next season. Newton’s last victory came on Jan. 24 during the 2022-23 season, but then dropped its next two meetings and have been swept the last two years. Grayson has dominated this head-to-head matchup during their own rise to the top, but Newton has certainly narrowed the gap and made things a lot more interesting heading into next season.
On the gridiron, Newton defeated Grayson for the first time in school history during the 2023 season in a 31-27 victory. Grayson owns the all-time series 8-1 and obviously went on to win last year’s Class 6A state title.
Around the Classification: In baseball, No. 1 ranked Etowah has recently climbed to No. 8 in the MaxPreps National poll and is 11-1 this season with its only loss coming in a three-game series that the Eagles won 2-of-3 against North Paulding. The Wolfpack were No. 3 in last week’s poll after taking 1-of-3 against No. 1 Etowah, however, North Paulding slid down this week to No. 7 after getting swept by No. 2 Walton and dropping their fifth game in the last six outings. Parkview, Buford, North Gwinnett and Lowndes each moved up one spot after North Paulding movement to No. 7 and Tift County knocked Lambert out of the poll and debuts at No. 9.
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