The American Heritage Patriots are continuing to ride high off their first state championship win school history as they enter the 2014 season.
The Patriots will have a lot of talent coming back on the field this year, but will be without one key player that was instrumental to the team’s winning ways. The big shoes of RB Sony Michel will have to be filled who was one of the biggest assets and senior leaders of the program last year. In the end though, the program picked up several new members from the mass deflections from the University School program.
Now the district does see a bit of a change this year as Key West is no longer a member of District 5A-16, choosing to go the independent route this season. That only gave American Heritage a solid reason to make the move to bolster the schedule with the change.
Looking at the schedule itself, eight of the ten teams made the playoffs last season with the other two teams just inches away of being in the big dance themselves. This speaks volumes that American Heritage wants to play the best the best when it comes to their schedule.
Overall, a three team district and challenging schedule should make things fun for this program to defend their state championship.
View American Heritage’s 2014 schedule here
THREE BEST OPPONENTS: St. Thomas Aquinas, Apopka, Miramar
THREE WEAKEST OPPONENTS: Chaminade-Madonna, Bolles, Miami Jackson
BEST OVERALL GAME: @ St. Thomas Aquinas, Friday, August 29 at Sun Life Stadium
Both of these programs picked up top talent from the mass deflections from University School during the offseason, so there will be a lot heat going into this game. Both teams will be stacked deeply and will be highly talented. Overall, this season opening game could draw a nice crowd to Miami Gardens and give high school fans a big treat. In the end though someone’s quest for a national title is going to get to derailed here to start off the season.
DISTRICT TRAP GAME: Miami Jackson, Thursday, October 2
This is a home game for the Patriots, but Miami Jackson is going to be under a new head coach and rebuilding the program, but that doesn’t mean all is safe. Miami Jackson will again for sure challenge for the district championship and if anything goes wrong for the Patriots could be the Generals rewards. Overall, don’t call things safe until this game comes to pass.
WEAKEST GAME: vs. Chaminade-Madonna, Friday, September 12
Chaminade-Madonna was one of the weakest teams to make the playoffs off last season. The program is going to be rebuilding this season to get things back to the way things. For American Heritage, though this game could be over for them by the half and anything less than a big point margin win would be a shock for us.
