THOMASTON — Jaquez Parks passed for three touchdowns and a career-high 273 yards to lead No. 8 state-ranked Griffin to a 28-14 win Friday night against archival Upson-Lee at Mathews Field as the Bears clinched first place in Region 4-AAAA Div. B and knocked the Knights out of playoff contention.

It was the third win in a row for Griffin (7-1 overall, 4-0 subregion) which jumped out to a 14-0 lead in the first half on the strength of a 15-yard shuffle pass to Moses Mayes and a 60-yard bomb to Trey Willis both in the second quarter.

Griffin — which now leads its longest-standing series 39-20-4 as it won its fourth in a row and for the eighth time in the last nine meetings against the Knights (3-5, 1-3) — seemed to put the game out of reach on a 32-yard touchdown pass to Quay Mangham with 3:11 left to play in the third quarter. Mangham, who ended the night with 132 yards on eight receptions, was Parks’ favorite target on a night where Parks completed 20 of 35 passes.

No place was Parks’ connection with with Mangham more obvious than on Griffin’s third scoring drive where the duo first hooked up on a 42-yard pass play and then six plays later — on fourth-and-31 — on the 32-yard touchdown play. The score gave Griffin a 21-0 lead.

It seemed insurmountable after Griffin stopped the Knights from inside the Griffin 5 in the final plays of the third quarter and the first few plays of the fourth quarter. However, it all quickly evaporated after the Knights’ Jacob Gross picked off Parks and returned the ball to the Griffin 30.

Upson-Lee quarterback Corey Moss fired a 10-yard pass to Travis Pittman on the next play and a 20-yard touchdown pass to Pittman on the play after that to breath life back into the Knights with 9:01 to play as they cut Griffin’s lead to 14 points.

After Griffin went three and out, lightning struck again for Upson-Lee as Moss tossed a 47-yard pass to Zemal Fuentes on the first play to bring the ball to the Griffin 4 where Moss, Upson-Lee’s leading rusher with 68 yards on 26 carries, scored on the next play to leave the Knights trailing 21-14 with 7:27 to play.

However, Griffin’s Parks-led offense mounted a 14-play, 57-yard scoring drive to quell any comeback. Parks threw a pass of 13 yards to Mangham two plays into the drive and then a 21-yard pass to Mangham four plays later on third-and-21 to keep the chains moving. Later in the drive, on third-and-8, Parks tossed a 6-yard pass to Mangham before unloading a 9-yard pass on the next play to Keyston Fuller to bring the ball down to the Upson-Lee 3 where Devontae Freeman — the Bears leading rusher with 66 yards on 13 carries, scored on the next play to ice the game with 1:29 to play.

GRIFFIN HIGH

Date |Opponent |Time

8/31 |@ Dutchtown |W 42-16

9/7 |@ Northgate |W 35-6

9/14 |Jonesboro* |W 34-33

9/21 |@ Woodland |W 52-20

9/28 |Stockbridge |L 17-14

10/5 |@ Riverdale* |W 35-14

10/12 |OPEN

10/19 |North Clayton* |W 42-20

10/26 |@ Upson-Lee* |W 28-14

11/2 |@ Spalding* |7:30

11/9 |Region Playoff

* — Region 4-AAAA, Div. B