nolebull813

North and South. (North Bracket) Fort Meade Frostproof Discovery Mulberry Lake Region Hardee Desoto (South Bracket) Moore Haven Lake Placid Avon Park Clewiston Lemon Bay Labelle Okeechobee You play the other 6 teams in your bracket, and 4 teams from the other bracket. The following year you play the other 3 plus one of the others you played in the first year and that would rotate every cycle.

I got 14 teams and their enrollment. The numbers could be a little off but not by much Moore Haven 311 Fort Meade 419 Frostproof 617 Lake Placid 807 Discovery 811 Avon Park 925 Clewiston 981 Desoto 1263 Hardee 1339 Lemon Bay 1350 Mulberry 1402 Labelle 1421 Lake Region 1553 Okeechobee 1745

I like the idea. If you get 12-20 or so teams and play a championship, I think the winner would feel validated. Heck the rural class has 34 teams and they crown a champion. If the Heartland can get somewhere close to that it would seem like a legit championship

In the 70’s they left the SWC and joined the Coral Coast Conference Point is they have been apart of a conference for decades. This Heartland Conference is nothing new, and is actually a throwback to all these decades ago.

1954-1969 Hardee was in the “Southwest Florida Conference” 8 teams Plant City Bartow Desoto Hardee Lake Wales Haines City Winter Haven Pasco Auburndale Kathleen There is more than 8 because teams came and gone over the years

Back in the day before playoffs mainly, there was nothing but conferences throughout the state. in 1952 and 1953 Hardee was part of the 11 team “South Florida Conference” it was….. Hardee Desoto Jesuit Manatee Tarpon Springs Winter Haven Clearwater Plant City Sarasota Fort Myers Bartow

I like the idea. With 500 plus teams it would be easy to come up with it. Right now the SSAA has an embarrassment of a playoff bracket. It’s so bad that I would like the adults who came up with the travesty to explain it to me with a straight face. In 2023 they had 10 brackets with one being 3 total teams. An 0-8 team got a bye and. 2-7 team beat a 1-8 team for the right to play the 0-8 team in the “championship” That is disgusting. I’m glad the SSAA is taking as many teams as possible who have no business competing for a real title, but they are making a mockery of the sport. I do like your idea though.

Steve Howard leaves Ida Baker to be the HC at East Lee County Ida Baker hires Cullen O Brien to replace him

Andy Siegel is at North Bay Haven

Robert E Lee is open

Mark Cristiani leading Riverview

Bailey Granier back at Masters Academy-Oviedo

Flagler Palm Coast is open

Jason Smith the OC for All Saints takes over at HC

This will be the first time since 1957 that Wimauma has a high school. From 1950-1957 the Wimauma Wildcats played football in the Tampa Bay Conference with teams like Brandon, Largo, Pinecrest, Turkey Creek, Brewster Tech and St Paul’s. In 1958, East Bay opened in Gibsonton and all the kids from all over Southwest Hillsborough County went there.

I think all public schools will have a varsity football program for sure. I just don’t know if they are gonna play a JV only schedule given the fact there most likely won’t be any seniors. That area down by Wimauma has exploded. Parrish just built a high school just South of the county line. Sumner is brand new. Lennard isn’t that old. It used to just be East Bay. Now they will have 4 high schools in a 8 mile radius. Which is crazy if you knew how rural that area used to be

So I looked up new public schools in Florida and this what I found. This doesn’t mean they will have football, it just means they are opening soon. Morgan High - Hillsborough county opening fall 2025 Legacy High - Port St Lucie opening fall 2025 Wellen Park - Sarasota County opening fall 2026 Soundside High School- Santa Rosa County opening fall 2026 CCC High School- Marion County opening fall 2026

Here’s the one issue. If schools have open enrollment, then the coach or AD couldn’t stop football players from transferring there so they couldn’t be picky or choosy. 5 might be too small. There are teams who get 5 transfers who aren’t very good. I think Middleburg got 5 plus transfers one year and they got thrown out of the 1st round: not all transfers are created equal. It’s a little more complicated.

Sounds like the teams at the most disadvantage in the entire state by far is the metro teams no talent wants to play for. Because how is 80 percent of the teams in Dade and Broward scary bad? They get their talent plucked by the top 20 percent. And those teams don’t have to recruit. Players know who is good and who has coaches with the right connections to increase their chances to get to college. And if they are already D1 they know which teams have the best chance to win a title. They don’t need to recruit anymore. The only thing I can think of that would make any sense to the issue with transfers is any team with 7 plus transfers in a offseason (random number. It can be 5-10 etc), that team automatically has to play in an open division bracket for the playoffs.

Look for Lake Wales to be joining the Heartland Athletic Association soon. Lol.

Anyone hear of new teams popping up for 2025? Any new public schools opening? I read that McLaughlin Academy in Lake Wales is gonna try 11-man football this coming year. I believe they have been around for a while but have never played football in their history

There is levels to everything: even in the NFL there are teams that are “horrible” by their own standards. So every level of athletics has horrible teams, bad, good, great and elite. That’s the name of the game. There is no way to make it where everyone is just “good”. To make it fair. That’s not the way competition is designed. But I do agree that teams that would be classified as “horrible” or “bad” should remove themselves from the competition that is way above their pay grade so that they can work on developing into something good. It’s no different than soccer in Europe. England has about 5-6 leagues. The bottom 4 one league gets demoted into the league under it, and the top 4 get promoted. I love that idea. We need a promotion/demotion system here

I love this idea. More teams need to follow suit. I believe some Orlando area teams did this but they remained in the FHSAA as independents but only played each other. There was about 10 teams and they all played each other and I think 1 “non district” game. It was 10 of the worst teams in the Orlando area who had less than a zero percent chance of winning state so it made sense. my hope is one day there is a group of quality teams in one division and a group of not quality in the other. like a division one and division two. The SSAA can be the league of teams who have no chance to win a real championship so they can compete in a bottom tier league for their own title it’s a win-win. Because it trims off all the fat and allows the teams who have a real chance compete for a real championship. While the other teams who normally would have no shot can stay separated, so it doesn’t water down the real league with a bunch of sacrificial lambs.

That’s what happened at DFB. The coach brought it in all the talent and the competed year in and year out. The second he leaves they become a homecoming opponent that everyone laughs at

The coach took Winter Haven to Knoxville to get their head beat in by some private school. So stupid. He took Lake Placid to Louisiana and Georgia and lost by 50 each time. He’s a punk. I don’t care what anyone says. Sending some JV level team to slaughter against teams way out of their league is irresponsible and embarrassing. Do you think the kids will remember some building and museums on their trip, or will they remember the 50 point a$$ bashing they were forced to receive by their punk coach?