....anyone know what time the tailgating starts on Friday and will the school close early? It's a 5 PM kickoff, so surely they will close early. 

Mike, my wife loves my obsession with high school football.  She will go to FSU games and Bucs games but she draws the line at high school games.  The last high school game she attended was 2006 when our youngest son finished playing.  Her idea of a good Friday night is relaxing with a glass of wine, Netflix and her boyfriend . . Wait! What?!    

Couldn’t agree with you more Jambun.    I’ve seen Atlantic Delray play Ely, Norland and Eau Gallie.  Ely and, surprisingly, Eau Gallie had no answer for ADR’s explosive offensive attack. ADR played Norland on a Thursday night.  Let’s just say, the atmosphere was less than electric.  The marching band left after playing the national anthem.  You could tell that ADR was not as engaged emotionally as they should’ve been.  As we know now Norland is a good but certainly not a spectacular team this year. It was Norland’s type of game until the fourth quarter before ADR exploded for 27 points.  Game over.  Like JD said, ADR just wore out Eau Gallie.  Now the question is can ADR be this successful against better teams?  They will have a chance to show this week against West Boca Raton.  Was Norland an outlier?  We shall see.     Last week ago Thursday, I attended the North Broward Prep at Pine Crest game. I must say I like it when I don’t have to pay for parking and a game ticket.  That being said, Pine Crest School has security that is similar to the White House.  If you are not safe at that school you are not safe at any school. Now to the game, North Broward Prep was definitely the more talented team. Pine Crest is what you would expect from a small private school that doesn’t operate like Chaminade.  The  North Broward Prep fans would disagree with me but the referees did not decide who won this game. I say it was coaching.  First of all, the Pine Crest coaches know what type of team they have, know what they cannot do, and optimize what they can do.  Hate to be critical but it appeared North Broward Prep coaches rely on having superior talent.  Especially in this game, the tortoise eventually outsmarted the hare.  With less than two minutes to go and the game tied, North Broward Prep had the ball.  They twice successfully ran the short out pass to their 6’4” receiver.  I know you see what is coming.   They ran the same short out pass to the sideline where the Pine Crest corner back was sitting on the route, intercepted it, took it to the house and Pine Crest wins 20-14. Now for the extra curricular.  Sometime during the second quarter the North Broward Prep fans thought the referees had it out for them.  It grew worse and worse as the game went on even to the point in the third quarter where fans were leaning over the fence and began arguing with people on the Pine Crest sideline.  (Pine Crest has stands only on the home field side.).  One fan, who appeared to be on roids, put his leg over the fence like he was ready to jump down on the Pine Crest sideline to get it on.  This guy was over tanned, wearing a tank top and old school gym shorts that we wore before the Fab Five at Michigan changed the style to long shorts.  At that point the police came and got him.  Normally, he would’ve been escorted out of the stadium.  Instead, after speaking with him for about 10 minutes, they let him walk up back in the stands. After the game was over both teams had gone through the handshake line.  Both teams were walking to separate end zones for their post game talks.  Not a player, but someone from Pine Crest went into the group of North Broward Prep players and started attacking one of them. This caused a melee that lasted for almost a minute. After breaking this up, the PA announcer told the Pine Crest fans to stay where they are until the North Broward Prep fans and players had left the stadium.   A few weeks ago I made a big deal out of what it was like to sit on the Northwestern side in their game against Central.  It was a lot of fun. By contrast, it was a lot of fun to watch these parents and others behave like nut cases.

This is what is lacking in Florida to my view. Fans like JDHoss, who don't have any relatives or ties to any schools, but attend high school games because he is a football fan, and enjoys the talent the state offers. More fans like this would be a huge positive. 

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