THOMASVILLE, Ga. — Immediately after their quarterfinal loss to Heard County last year, the Thomasville Bulldogs began looking at how to fill some big shoes left by some impactful seniors.

One of the positions left open was perhaps the game’s most important — quarterback. The Bulldogs weren’t looking to replace just any signal caller, either. JT Rice exited the program after breaking numerous school passing records during his senior season.

Thomasville’s answer to its quarterback quandary very likely lies just adjacent to Veterans Memorial Stadium, at MacIntyre Park Middle School. At least for now.

Chad Mascoe may be just a rising freshman, but at 6-foot and 202 pounds, he already has a varsity build, and on the field, he’s already received national accolades and attention from top-tier colleges.

Mascoe is a native of Kissimmee, Fla., and comes from a family of talented football players. His father, Chad Sr., played linebacker at Central Florida in the early 2000s. The younger Mascoe never met his uncle on his mother’s side, who just so happened to be a football legend — Pro Football Hall of Famer Derrick Thomas, who played a stellar career as a linebacker for the Kansas City Chiefs before his life was tragically cut short in 2000.

“It’s great hearing all the things that they did, and hearing everything that goes around high school football,” Mascoe said. “Hearing everything that they did is inspiring to me.”

Mascoe has lived in Thomasville before, but moved back to the Rose City this year from Gwinnett County. Unlike his dad or his uncle, Chad played on offense, originally as a tailback, before being moved to signal caller.

“My coach saw me on my team throwing the ball around and saw that I could throw it far,” Mascoe said. “He put me there and I’ve been playing it ever since.”

And he’s thrived, leading two different youth football teams to FBU (Football University) national championships — one in Broward (Fla.) and another in Gwinnett County.

During his last year playing in North Georgia, Mascoe was the recipient of the General Dennis D. Cavin award, given to the nation’s most outstanding middle school player. He threw for 1,635 yards and 22 touchdowns, and ran for six more scores as the leader of the eighth-grade Gwinnett Football League team last year.

That’s a lot of credentials to live up to going into high school, but Mascoe is only focused on what’s next.

“Everything that happened, I don’t think of that no more,” he said. “I’m in high school now so it’s way different.”

Colleges like Florida State, Georgia and Tennessee have already hosted him for visits as an eighth grader. Mascoe’s arm, speed and his frame have drawn comparisons to another Georgia high school football product — current Carolina Panthers quarterback Cam Newton.

“I model my game after him because he can run and throw the ball,” Mascoe said. “He can do everything. He’s the hype man of his team.”

While Mascoe has dominated the middle school game, varsity football is an entirely different world with bigger and faster players, as he’s discovering in spring practice.

“In eighth grade it was easier,” he said. “Kids were much smaller and they weren’t as skilled as me. Now it’s the other way around.”

Mascoe’s biggest hurdles in spring are not at all physical. His situation is mostly mental — namely learning how to read coverages and knowing when to just hand off to Tan Gelin and Malek Miller instead of tucking and running.

“Physically, he’s ready to go right now,” Thomasville coach Zach Grage said. “Right now our biggest thing with him is remembering that he’s 14 years old and the mental game still has to catch up to him. We’re asking him to be JT Rice right now, and JT was in his second year of this offense and he was 18.

“Physically he’s got all the tools but right now Patrick (McNeill)’s ahead of him mentally just because he was in our system last year. But I’ll tell you what — he’s picking it up quick. He’s a student of the game.”