Update Tuesday, June 26, 2016
Pastor Rey Cruz of New Testament Baptist Church, the school that sponsors Dade Christian, told Florida High School Football this afternoon that the football program “was not eliminated to save the school,” as originally told yesterday in our initial story (down below this update).
According to Cruz, the football program is a money-maker for them and would have no intent on eliminating the football program to save the school. He says the issue goes back to the coaches.
“We found out that the coaches decided to terminate the football program due to the lack of student participation. In about February we found that spring practice was canceled and we tried to change their minds in that regard to renew the program and go ahead and have spring practice. We found out that they had canceled the football schedule and therefore could not reschedule anything with the Florida High School Athletic Association.”
Basically Cruz says the church was shocked by the moves made.
“We were shocked by this and we tried in every way possible to revive the football program. The football program is a money maker for us, so if we were in financial troubles, which we are not. If we were in financial troubles, we would want to keep the football program open and available.”
He said the financial troubles that were first reported by WSVN-TV in Miami were greatly exaggerated and was not the church’s choice to pull the plug on the program.
“It was not our choice what-so-ever [to eliminate the football program]”
For now, Cruz said that the plan is for Dade Christian to sit out the 2016 season with no football program, while looking ahead to having the football program back on the field in 2017 competing as an independent, possibly in an independent league before likely being able to get back in the FHSAA State Series in 2019 once the three-year wait period is over for dropping out of a district during current classification cycle.
As for the coaches that resigned? Cruz also said that was not true as they were asked not to come back next school year.
“They did not resign. They were asked not to come back next year. We never received a resignation from them.”
Basically it came down to enrollment as for why the coaches were asked not to come back, Cruz claims.
“We would loved to have all of our teachers come back, but we just didn’t have the enrollment at the time to ask all of our teachers back. We asked the administrators of the school to make a choice to who would you have back, who are the best teachers so that we can ask them to come back. We expected our enrollment to be half of what it was last year.”
Basically in the end the school is still going to be there and will bounce back after going through this storm of news over the last five to six months.
“The school is not going to close down, which has been the rumor that has been prevailing out there.”
Original Story posted Monday, June 27, 2016
MIAMI – Chalk up tough times for the loss of one of South Florida’s well known small school football programs.
Dade Christian, which appeared a few years ago in the 2012 Class 2A state championship game before falling to University Christian, has terminated its football program for the foreseeable future.
According to a close source to the school “terminated its football program in an effort to save the school.” The source was granted anonymity by Florida High School Football as things are still being sorted out.
Also according to the source, most of the football team’s players have transferred to different schools around Miami-Dade County, that including stand out quarterback Alec Carr who has landed at Miami Norland. Both head coach Nick Martinez and AD/Basketball Coach Steve Fitzgerald also resigned from the school according to the source.
Other schools to have benefited due to the demise of Dade Christian’s football team include Chaminade-Madonna, Gulliver Prep, Champagnat (a now-former district rival for Dade Christian) and Goleman.
News first arose back in February when WSVN-TV in Miami reported that Dade Christian was facing possible closure which has been operations for over half century. WSVN said at the time that financial issues facing the school were part of the possibility that could close the school altogether.
As of now the plans are for the school to remain open, but without a football program that it has successfully fielded for many years.
