File PhotoValdosta head coach Alan Rodemaker and defensive line coach/director of football operations DeMario Jones celebrate after clinching the Region 1-6A championship against Coffee at Bazemore-Hyder Stadium on Oct. 28.

VALDOSTA — Even though Valdosta head coach Alan Rodemaker has appeared in the big game on three different occasions, he doesn’t want his team to take a thing from his experiences when it travels to the Georgia Dome for the Class 6A state championship game against Tucker.

“I haven’t figured out how to win one of these things yet,” Rodemaker said with a laugh Tuesday.

Rodemaker is 0-3 in state title games with three different schools, but considering it has been seven years since his last appearance, and Friday marks his first as the head coach of a program, he doesn’t foresee his prior experiences assisting him in his fourth go.

“When I have experiences over 18 or 20 years of coaching, when I do something, I’m usually drawing from, not only my time playing, I played for 16 years from the age 6 to 22, I pull from my 18 years of coaching,” Rodemaker said Tuesday. “So I’m not sure I really pull anything from those state championships. All I’ll say is, I didn’t really want to play a team from our region… But the others, it’s another football game. I just think you prepare for it, and you don’t treat it any differently.”

Valdosta and its title game opponent Tucker are on nearly opposite ends of spectrum when it comes to championship game experience.

While the Wildcats has made it past the second round of the playoffs for the first time since 2010, clinching their first championship game appearance since 2003, the Tigers made their last appearance in a state title game in 2013 and they’ve advanced to at least the quarterfinal round of the state playoffs eight times in the past 10 seasons.

Valdosta has been able to overcome its relative lack of big-game experience throughout the season, but the championship game under the lights in the Georgia Dome is a different animal. Luckily for the Wildcats, they have some recent history at the dome themselves to draw from.

Last year, under then-head coach Rance Gillespie, Valdosta opened its season against Norcross in the Georgia Dome as part of the 24th annual Corky Kell Classic. Although the Wildcats lost the game 34-31, they are still taking away lessons from the experience.

“Hopefully we won’t walk around just looking at the ceiling the whole time, saying, ‘wow,’” Rodemaker said. “Hopefully we’ll understand we’re there on a business trip and we go in there and take care of business on the field.

“It’s kind of like the movie Hoosiers. The field is going to be 100 yards long. It’s going to be 53 1/3 wide.”

Rodemaker acted as the defensive backs coach on the 1993 Thomas County Central team that fell 14-12 in the Class 3A title game against in-town rival Thomasville, and he was the defensive coordinator on Peach County’s 1998 team that lost the Class 3A championship against Dougherty 27-7. He was also the defensive backs coach at Byrnes in 2009 when it dropped a rematch against region-rival Dorman 28-17 in South Carolina’s Class 4A title game.

One assistant, running backs coach Jason King, hasn’t even made it to a championship game, let alone win one. Before playing for Auburn, King carried the ball at Newnan, where the furthest he ever advanced was the semifinal round his sophomore year.

King was just a sophomore when Newnan fell 20-10 against Camden County — Camden won the state title a week later against Valdosta in the ‘Cats’ last championship game appearance — so he took for granted the opportunity in front of him. He wants to make sure no one on this Wildcats team does the same.

“As I tell kids now, they’ve got to know that this is special,” King said. “My sophomore year, when we played Camden, I figured we’ll be fine. I’ll be back here in a year.

“It didn’t hit me until my senior year ended against Camden again, that dang, that’s it. So it tell kids now, you’ve got to realize, this is special right here. This might be the best team you play on in your four years here.”

Valdosta defensive line coach/director of football operations DeMario Jones never played for a state championship game either, but he did earn a couple of national championship rings during his time as a player and a graduate assistant at Valdosta State.

Jones and the rest of his Blazer teammates were recently honored as the university celebrated their 2007 national championship, giving him a first-hand look at how champions are remembered forever.

“I used that as motivation in preseason…” Jones said. “Just getting these kids to understand, when you win a championship, you will forever be remembered. You’ll never forget it. You’ll carry that experience with you the rest of your life, knowing that you’re No. 1. There’s nobody else better than you.

“The later in the year we got, the more we started winning, I just think they started listening a little bit more. Sometimes as a coach, you wonder if they’re even listening to you, then you start hearing them say things that you say more and more.”

Playing football with the highest of stakes is an exhilarating experience, but it’s not the most memorable experience when it comes to winning a championship. To Jones, it was the journey, alongside friends like offensive coordinator, and then teammate, Tucker Pruitt.

“Most of the guys you’ll probably talk to, it really isn’t the actual championship game, it’s the extra moments,” Jones said. “As a player, it was the practices, the meetings, sharing meals together, the travel, that’s the kind of stuff you remember, just because you understand the atmosphere is a little bit more exciting. You know there’s something on the line.

“Getting to share that with those guys, and knowing you’re around people that love you and care about you, and you feel the same thing, and that’s been the whole thing with our team.”

Derrick Davis is a sports reporter at the Valdosta Daily Times.