MOULTRIE — Many people still recall Colquitt County’s state championship three years ago by the numbers 12-13-14-15.

As, on December 13, 2014, the Packers won the title by defeating Archer to win their 15th game of the season.

It’s an easy way to recall a memorable finish to a remarkable perfect season.

At least one person remembers a different set of numbers associated with the game.

His touchstones are 4:48 and nine.

With the Packers clutching a 28-24 lead, Kiel Pollard made a fair catch of a Tigers punt deep in Packers territory with 4:48 remaining in the game.

Archer never got the ball again as the Packers ran out the clock on Colquitt County’s first state title in 20 years by giving the ball to Sihiem King nine consecutive times.

The Tigers knew the All-State Packer running back would get the ball, but were unable to stop him.

Three of those nine carries resulted in Colquitt County first downs.

Archer and Colquitt County will meet again at 7:30 tonight for the first time since then in a state quarterfinal in Lawrenceville.

The roles will be somewhat reversed tonight.

Colquitt County was 14-0 and Archer was 11-3 in the Georgia Dome that night, although the Tigers were on an 11-game winning streak after losing their first three by a total of 15 points.

Tonight, it is Archer that is unbeaten, reeling off 12 straight victories after going just 4-7 a year ago.

The Packers go into the game with three defeats, including two in a row in Region 1-7A games to end the regular season.

A handful of current Colquitt County and Archer football players might have been on the sidelines that evening as freshmen and could remember that evening.

There also are quite a number of Packer football fans who were at the Dome that night and who celebrated their early Christmas present loudly and earnestly.

Then-Georgia High School Association executive director Gary Phillips is remembered saying the Colquitt County contingent was the largest group he could remember seeing at a state championship game.

The victory gave Packers coach Rush Propst, who had won five championships at Hoover High in Alabama, his first in Georgia.

Four years earlier, he took his 2010 Packer team to the state championship game, only to come up on the short end of a 52-38 score.

He called the 2014 championship “as gratifying a state championship as I’ve had.”

It was special, he said, “because I think we are into a new era of success.”

And he was right.

The Packers went 15-0 again the next season and have won 17 of 24 since then.  The immediate future, especially next season, also appears bright.

The 2014 Packers opened with a win over Mill Creek at McEachern High in the Corky Kell Classic, then got the statement victory at home the following week, pounding Hoover, 35-14.

After cruising through the non-region part of the schedule, Colquitt won all five of its league games.

In the playoff victories over Rockdale County, Dacula, Milton and McEachern, all on the Tom White Field at Mack Tharpe Stadium, Colquitt averaged 53 points a game.

The state championship game against Archer, which was in just its fifth year of playing a full varsity football schedule at the time, would be much lower-scoring and much closer.

But in the end, perhaps more satisfying.

Archer drove 66 yards on its first possession and scored on a 4-yard run by Dylan Singleton to go up 7-0 with 5:38 left in the first quarter.

Colquitt answered on its next possession when quarterback Chase Parrish hit a streaking Marquan Greene in stride for a 40-yard touchdown. Baby Lou Martinez converted and the game was tied 7-7.

Two plays after Greene scored, Colquitt County’s Zay Lewis picked off a Gabe Tiller pass and ran it to the Archer 7.

Parrish threw a touchdown pass to King on the next play and after the Martinez extra point, Colquitt led 14-7.

Archer tied the game on a 55-yard touchdown pass from Tiller to Singleton and took a 17-14 lead on a 47-yard Cole Fisher field goal.

Later in the second quarter, Davis dropped a potential touchdown pass in the end zone and Fisher missed a field goal attempt on the next play.

Taking over on the 20, the Packers marched 80 yards to score on 1-yard run by King, who rushed for 53 yards on the drive and Colquitt led 21-17 at the half.

On Archer’s first drive of the second half, Tiller was chased out of the pocket and fumbled when hit by Dee Walker. Tomarcio Reese recovered and the Packers were in business on the Archer 35.

Moments later, the Packers faced a third-and-goal from the Archer 7-yard line.

Parrish threw to the sideline in the end zone where Ty Lee made the catch and got a toe just inside the stripe for what proved to be the game-winning touchdown.

Martinez kicked the extra point and the Packers led 28-17 with 6:46 left in the third quarter.

Archer scored on its next possession to cut the Packers lead to 28-24 with 2:56 left in the quarter

But the Tigers snapped the ball just eight times the rest of the game, thanks primarily to King, who carried 33 times for 125 yards in the championship game, and the Packers unsung offensive line.

Colquitt County now has two backs – junior Ty Leggett and sophomore Daijun Edwards – who have the ability tonight to put up the kind of numbers King did three years ago.

The Packers might need a King-like performance on the grass at Archer.

If they can beat the Tigers for a second straight time away from friendly Tom White Field at Mack Tharpe Stadium, the Packers will go on the road again to meet the Brookwood-Tift County winner in one semifinal.

The Packers have a recent score to settle with each of those two teams.