Beek

its not against the bylaws to be independent, it is to create another series or championship within fhsaa

I feel a 8 man decision would be the death of many of these programs. Kids simply would use their "school of choice" decision to transfer somewhere else. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer scenario. No matter what any one thinks or says. Football is a 11 man sport for the kids. They do not watch 8 man football on Saturday or Sunday. They will not believe that they could be recruited to play for a 11 man team on saturday. So the result would be even worse for those programs that you suggest 2 years ago it was brought up by a bunch of independent fhsaa teams, that wanted to start an independent league within fhsaa and play for a so called independent championship. That idea was immediately shut down citing the bylaws. These are mostly all of the teams that we are speaking of and the ones that you suggested. Some of them went back into districts because of the suburban-metro-rural classifications now. Some of them feel they might have a fighting chance with this scenario. Only time will tell.

Not to be argumentative but hold on a second! We are one of those "glorified JV teams" by your assumption and rankings and strength of schedule. We practice 3 hours every day, just like the best teams, we go over film with the players for hours. We work in the weight room. We have detailed practice plans. We have individual instruction, Team time, 7v7, inside run and all of those sessions. I dont know how anyone can say we dont practice as hard as any other team. Do we have the skill or quality of players as all of those so called "harder preparation" teams. It is not for the lack of coaching or player effort. It just comes down to heart and will and actual player quality. We dont have the physical size on the line. That is not a lack of preparation, It is just who we are. We dont have a #1 quarterback, Does that make us a less prepared team? And yes we have put a running clock on a opponent this year. But that doesnt make them a "Glorified JV team". Last time we played them they beat us! Kids graduated and transferred. A bad scenario for them a good one for us. But i am willing to bet, those coaches are working just as hard today as they were when they beat us.

I touched on this in a different thread. 1. The white cap assigned to this game had been previously banned from officiating at this school. The assigner was aware and had kept him from coming many times in the past. I wont go into why unless you feel it is important to this discussion. 2. The no calls on egregious holding and pass interference calls was horrible. But it went both ways. The only time a holding call was thrown was when the play went for any type of yardage. Again I agree a holding call can be had on every play, So why choose only the plays when a team has a gain to negate that play only. 3. invisible flags thrown. on 2 separate occasions when we had a 40+ yard gain a flag was thrown post play down field near the end of the play. The first time when asked what it was for I was told holding by a lineman 50 yards away from where the official was standing. The flag wasnt thrown by the referee who was near those players. But the one who was 50 yards away from where the suspected holding was called (had a coach in his ear!). The referee was asked who was in position to make that call. He just picked up the flag 50 yards away and walked back and marked off the holding without a place marker flag for where the penalty supposedly occurred. The second occasion was a similar situation where our receiver was hit way late out of bounds and the other team was called for the late hit. Then when the officials got together all of a sudden there was a offensive false start call. no flag was thrown and the play continued to its finish which resulted in the defensive penalty. This caused me to waste a time out for clarification. I was told that the official on my sideline, standing directly in front of me dropped a flag for false start (no flag was ever thrown, also shouldn't the play be whistled dead?) But after the conference. the penalty was upheld and the false start was walked off first, then the 15 yard personal foul was applied after that. 4. According to the other teams stats, they were penalized 10 times for 108 yards and us 12 times for 83 yards. The opposing head coach was livid at the officiating as well. He told me that this was the worst officiating he had ever seen. Neither of us had had near these penalties all year combined. 5. To top this off, the assigner when asked why we only get "B" crews to our games he said that "you are so bad that we wont waste good officials to come to your games" I personally have a friend (not someone who would not call a fair game)who is a white cap in the area he constantly asks for his crew to be assigned to our games. He keeps getting told no and instead gets the game of the week! If i polled my staff, i am sure I could come up with more scenarios. These are the ones that come to mind first. I guess the worst part of this is we are pretty used to this type of officiating. I could write books on the improper officiating I have experienced in my 8 years as a high school coach. The best one yet happened in Polk county. We had a 4th down play the 5 yard line, which was painted was the line to gain. Our back ran the ball and it was placed clearly near the 4 yard line 3 feet past the 5 yard line. The chains were dropped and the official on the sideline signaled 1st down. The opposing coach called a time out and asked for a measurement. Here is where it gets interesting. There was no marker on the chains to tell where the chains were supposed to be. But everyone agreed that the 5 yard line was the line to gain. So the official comes to the sideline and sees a place in the ground where he feels the chains were and decides thats where the mark should be. Picks up the chains and then goes and measures. Obviously the 4 yard line was a foot too short and the ball was turned over on downs. When asking the white cap how that could be. I was told that it wasnt the line judges call to signal first down. And the opposing team, who was operating the chains shouldn't have put them down. So he had to approximate the chains location. Film clearly shows that the 5 yard line was correct. (have to love that) I really never complain more than I feel is what I can get away with without repercussions. Because if i complain too much , it will just come back to me in a bad way. All I ever ask for is the poor officiating is kept even between us and the other team! On the flip side there is a white cap that has also gone out of his way to help me understand interpretations of the rules. He has contacted me during the following week to apologize for a bad call where he was wrong and admitted it. He has also called me and shown me the rule and explained what we did wrong! To me you cannot be more transparent than that.

Having just lost to horizon. They are a very well put together team. I do feel that had we not have played in the downpour, granted they had to as well. And we could have capitalized on our 3 red zone trips. The outcome would have been different. Not making excuses. They beat us fair (as the officials could see or not see it) and square. Their running back and qb combo is a force to be reckoned with. I also agree that they could be looking at 7-3 or 8-2. Right now our strength of schedule is a -30.9 But thats who we are! Started the year at 550 and moved up to 484 so far. Toho ranked 297 and Horizon 301

According to score stream Freedom Tampa 20, Brandon 44

Officiating is an issue! Because we are lowly , horrible poinciana we always get assigned the "z" crew. I would never call them a "B" crew because that would be a compliment! For us it is when we are at home. We get much better officials when we are away and out of county. But our assigner believes we do not deserve a good officiating crew. He has even so much as told us that. This is not to take away from some of the good officials on the crew. Because a few of them are. I am not going to say who gets the better calls. It seams as it is always against us. But that is not always true. They spread poor calls around for both teams some of the time. I understand getting officials is tough, but continuing to use poor ones doesnt help getting new ones due to the public opinion of officiating. Remember the public in the stands is better than all of us combined! We always know there are holds on every play. but every time there is a big play it comes back. hits out of bounds only matter some times. pass interference only happens once in a while, even if the receiver gets tackled down field. No such thing as offensive pass interference. A kids stand over someone and taunts them right in front of a white cap. "he doesnt see it" or " yes I saw that but thats not my call" But an official 50 yards away from a play can make a holding call that the couldnt see if it happened right in front of them. None of this has to do with the fact we lost last night. The other team outplayed us. In fact they were far more critical of the officiating than we were. Maybe we are just used to it. But the white cap that was there last night had been banned from coming to our school because of prior incidences. He lost control of a game and numerous other officiating issues. But the assigner just happened to forget this week. and Didnt sent the list until friday morning. He has been stopped 10 or more times from coming. But last night slipped through because of the assigner not caring or "forgetting". I only have problems not solutions!

Poinciana has 2 d1 prospects at this moment. One or 2 others may have a d1 offer by the end of the year! These wont be Big D1's , but d1 anyway

Much appreciated. I really want to say something about the kids we had transfer or move in to our school. The 5 players who previously played for or went to Osceola who are now on our roster have the best character of any kids I have had in the 9 years I've been at Poinciana. Their demeanor, attitudes and being a non selfish team player are some of the best attributes I have ever seen. You guys build quality student-athletes. Not just a bunch of thugs who play football. I know these kids may have not been a big loss to your program. But it was defiantly a big gain for our program. We also had a Quarterback from a state final four team from NC move into our zone in the last moment. What a great surprise that was! We now have to get them used to playing with each other and the other players on our roster. We have 17 starters who were not on our team from last fall. Kids who moved in, some transfers in and kids who worked on their academics and made it back from poor grades from covid. We played sloppy last night. We made mistakes. We were even down 16-14 with 8 minutes to go. Avon park is no joke, they are a good team. They drove us down the field methodically. But our kids kept on working and the result shows.

Somehow, Poinciana got our game in. Basically it was because we were so far south of Orlando. We had a long lightning delay with about a minute to go in the first half. But we waited it out and finished the game. Poinciana 28- Avon Park 16

Myself for one, I do not want my school AD or my county AD to mandate my schedule. My fears are that first they would want to schedule only close opponents to avoid travel costs and secondly they would not have the pulse of the program to know where the program is at on a competitive level. Over or under scheduling talent. Which wouldn't help. No disrespect intended towards the AD's, Just my opinion

That didnt come out quite the way I meant it. LOL The ones I am counting on will be there , its the ones that I have not seen all summer who show up on the first day and possible new players that I have never met!

Obviously, Ill be there! It will be interesting to see who shows up.

Bird is a great guy. I also coach wrestling so I have had many interactions with him. A class act! Tribit, having been under bird in the past and already a good AD in the county. This should be a easy transition. From what I could see Bird was already passing the torch to him as early as last season!

Well first things first, we have to trend up before we can trend back down. Having been at the bottom for ever, there is only one way to go! This years kids are motivated and have a great attitude among the team. Nothing negative! More kids than ever in the weight room this summer. More coaches than ever too!

Thank you.

I can confirm that those 2 are enrolled at Poinciana, Perry had a great game for us in the spring. It has defiantly benefited him as he already has multiple offers on the table. We already have some things working for DJ, and should be able to confirm a offer for him in the next few days and he hasnt even played a down for us. I have no idea who starts and who doesnt at Osceola. Those 2 will be difference makers for us. You have to remember our dismal season last year which involved removing most of our seniors. We are returning 10 varsity starters and a bunch of kids who played varsity because we had no choice. We too have had at least 4 kids leave for greener grass to 1 school, just slightly out of county. I wish them the best of luck in their new place. I have always said. If Poinciana could just have the kids who are zoned for Poinciana we could compete. I know numerous kids playing for other teams who are zoned for Poinciana. But the flip side to that is you do have to have something to offer. The one thing we do well is get kids into schools. If the player takes the offer or not is up to them. We are playing an independent schedule again this year in hopes to bring success to the program. We finally have stability in coaching, which has never happened here. The district we were slated for would not have done us any good right now. Hopefully in a year or 2 with success we can rejoin a district and finally compete at that level.

Checked max preps, Cocoa is in 2s-12, according to FHSAA thats region 3 Updated 2s-13 Discovery Ft. Meade Frostproof Mulbery Tenoroc

We appreciate the vote of confidence. We have had a few kids come home. Meaning kids who were originally zoned for Poinciana that have been elsewhere decided to come to Poinciana for their senior year.

North Port has also scheduled Poinciana!

Our helmets were sent out December 9th. This is the story so far! Due to a logistics error our helmets were clearly marked to go to ohio. the transportation company shipped them to mexico instead. At some point once my AD, who was prompted by me in late march, called to check on our helmets. At this time it was discovered that they were in the wrong country!. So they were shipped to ohio. Spring practice started on monday, we received our helmets tuesday but in a incomplete fashion. 90% of the chinstraps were sent back in a bag marked 'rejected". upon further research, they were not even the ones that went out with our helmets. We studied the pictures and they were a different style on our speedflex. We also did not receive any of the hardware back to mount the chinstraps. We also received back 2 rejected helmets. looking at one of those something wasnt right. The dated code on the helmet and the style helmet did not match our inventory. It was not our helmet!, Now i wonder how many of the helmets we got back had been swapped. Our riddell rep has been awesome trying to fix this situation. He has had new parts shipped to us at no cost to mount the chinstraps. He also brought us all the new chinstraps he had to replace some of the ones which weren't ours. We have been told that once spring is over they will pick up all of our helmets and redo them again. (they werent happy with the paint, placed into bags while still wet). We are still trying to figure out about the chinstrap issue. I personally feel they will just give us new ones, as we had just replaced most of ours last year. The only thing is myself and coaches will check the dates on our helmets to be sure they are ours, I had already numbered inside all of our helmets as an inventory control measure. We have aging reports that show the month and year of manufacture and style of all of the helmets. So this wont be too hard to check and prove.

I require all my players to do something in the off season. By that I mean another sport. We have players participate in wrestling, track, weightlifting and baseball all the time. A very few play basketball, mainly because the basketball players think they are too good to play football so there is not much crossover at our school. The ones who do not participate in another sport must do work outs with the football team. We usually do not have many who do not participate in another sport. Most of our coaches coach other sports as well so getting the kids to play is a bit easier. For wrestling in particular, I feel football players gain many benefits from wrestling. leverage, additional strength training and stamina are the largest. It also uses different muscle groups which is also beneficial.

Appreciate the help. Just giving information. All Good

independent teams are listed. Liberty for what I was told by my ad is going back into a district, and we are staying independent, we already declared that on home campus So now we are looking for games as some teams already canceled on us even after they confirmed. But I get it. Some of the Polk county teams we play got favorable, competitive districts for them. So I understand why they went back. Heck, when you are ranked in the bottom 20 in the state, A lot of people will call. LOL

Liberty is not on the list either, maybe others Didnt see Cocoa Beach