Czar

Harrison County will travel to Johnson Central in the opening round of the playoffs. What’s your thoughts and predictions?

The 8-0 Johnson Central Golden Eagles will travel to the 2-5 Greenup County Musketeers in a district matchup. Johnson Central leads the all time series with Greenup County 16-8. Greenup’s last win in the series was in 2003.

The Johnson Central Golden Eagles will travel to face the Rowan County Vikings in a Class 4A, District 6 game on Friday, 10/10/2025. The Golden Eagles enter the game with a perfect 7-0 record, and the Vikings enter with a 1-5 record. Johnson Central leads the all-time series against Rowan County 14-1.

This is the district opener for both teams. Boyd County comes into this game with a 4-1 record while Johnson Central’s record is 5-0.

Elder (OH) Frederick Douglass Highlands Covington Catholic Lexington Catholic TB-36

Ryle Manual Highlands Owensboro Trinity TB-58

The Johnson Central Golden Eagles welcome the Pikeville Panthers to Jim Matney Field for a week 4 matchup between two Eastern Kentucky powers. Both teams are coming off impressive week 3 wins against Raceland and Belfry. Can Johnson Central slow down the Pikeville quick-strike offense? Can Pikeville match the physicality of Johnson Central's defensive and offensive fronts?

Pikeville Scott County Johnson Central Frederick Douglass Moeller (OH) Tiebreaker #1: 48

Cooper Johnson Central Manual Glasgow Belfry Tiebreaker#1 51

Madison Central makes the trip to Paintsville to take on Johnson Central. Can the Indians make it two wins in a row against the Golden Eagles?

Bell County Apollo Meade County Ashland Ryle Tiebreaker #1: 51

Bump.

The Golden Eagles and the Cougars will face off in the first game of the Black and Blue Bowl at Shelby Valley High School. Johnson Central leads the all time series with Letcher Central 7-0. The game will be on Saturday 8/23/2025 at 6:00PM.

8/23 Letcher Central at Shelby Valley 8/29 Madison Central 9/5 at Belfry 9/12 Pikeville 9/19 Pulaski County 9/26 Boyd Count (District Game) 10/3 at Corbin 10/11 at Rowan County (District Game) 10/18 at Greenup County (District Game) 10/24 Ashland 10/31 Bye

No it’s called subbing the JV in and the other team leaving their varsity in the entire game.

What is the hold up then?

The head coach and athletic director at Johnson Central was informed by Coach Haywood that they no longer wanted to play the game on week 11 because of the risk of injuries going into the playoffs. Coach Matney had tried to get the game moved to a earlier week for years but Belfry refused. They also said that the series was no longer competitive for them and they were looking to schedule someone else but that they still may play the game on week 3. After the conversation between the two head coaches, one of Belfry’s assistants posted on the list serve that they were looking for a week 3 game. So in a span of maybe 45 minutes, they went from possibly playing week 3 to Belfry looking for another opponent. So instead of Belfry hosting Johnson Central on week 3 in 2023 they’re traveling 3 hours away to Southwestern. The crowds during the Belfry and JC games were always massive and for many years it was the prime game in Eastern Kentucky. The two teams are playing in 2024 as a part of the Pike County Bowl. Before someone states that’s the reason why they aren’t playing this year, I want to add that JC and Pikeville agreed to play each other almost a month after Belfry dropped JC from their schedule. The Pike County Bowl had nothing to do with the decision to drop JC.

It’s still hard to believe that Belfry and Johnson Central will no longer be playing. They’ve played each other for the past 20 years. The first three years were scrimmages and the last 17 during the final week of the regular season.

I’ve heard that Mayfield and Johnson Central will be playing the next two years.

Raceland is no longer playing Johnson Central. A week after Coach Salmons told one of our high school assistants that they will host JC this season on week 5 he informed them today that he already has an opponent for week 5. It looks like he had no intention of playing that game and was looking for another game the entire time. I guess he feels like he can compete more with 5A Highlands than 4A Johnson Central. So far JC has Madison Central, Pikeville and Ironton on their non district schedule. If this is the norm for the Raceland head coach it’s no wonder he’s always looking for games. I can 100 percent guarantee that Raceland would’ve benefited more financially by playing Johnson Central that week than Highlands.

Johnson Central will be traveling to Raceland week 5.

From what I was told by someone at the game it was an assistant coach that went after and bumped the official. Paintsville can’t complain about the officials in this game. The white hat that was assigned to the game does all of their youth and middle school officiating. One of the other officials is a Paintsville graduate and another is the uncle of a recent Paintsville player.

Ashland will be scrimmaging Lexington Catholic at Cabell Midland High School in Ona West Virginia.

He’s referring to Joe Chirico.

Exactly! There’s a reason that Jim Matney has been the only one to win at Johnson Central.