This is my football blog for 2009. I will ramble on about college and high school football. It is not a commercial endeavor, merely for my own personal enjoyment. I was born in and currently reside in the sunshine state, so a greater emphasis will naturally be placed on football close to home. I do follow prep football nationally to certain extent. Having lived in Texas, Alabama, and Kansas, and having enjoyed games in Missouri, Georgia and Tennessee as well, I have experienced first hand, a lot of good high school football. In fact, I have watched 4 Heisman trophy winners play in person before they ever stepped on the college field. Ty Detmer played for his dad Sonny at Southwest high on the outskirts of San Antonio. The school was less than 2 miles from our house, so I watched a lot of his junior and senior season. Charlie Ward played for Thomas County Central, when I lived in Tallahassee and as the informed know, Thomasville is about 30 minutes up the road, across the state line. He was special early on. Danny Wuerffel played for Fort Walton Beach High, my wife’s high school. I saw him play 4 or 5 times for the Vikings, including the state championship (w/ bro in law John and son Dent) where they spanked STA, and Danny RAN for a 80 yard TD. And then there is Mr Tebow, who although he was home schooled, played his football for the Nease Panthers out of St Augustine. I only saw him in person once, but watched him on TV against Hoover, Ala and listened to the 4A Championship game, where he went in to the game at the end, at NOSEGUARD, to help seal the deal. He has made a pretty good showing in Gainesville so far…Growing up in Okaloosa County, and being a 2nd generation Crestview Bulldog, I understand the Friday Night Lights experience, where the whole town would be at the game and rally around their team. It is not that way everywhere, especially in larger cities, where several teams coexist and folks have a lot more to do on a Friday night. I guess that helps explain my love for high school football.
It is a sport that has evolved “nationally”, as more and more the stronger teams are playing inter state games, and are being broadcast on ESPN and other national networks. With the internet that Al Gore did not invent, it is easier than ever to keep up with team from any state you want, and with my satellite dish, I can watch games in Colorado, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and California. I should also mention that I do freelance coverage of prep football for a large central Florida newspaper. It doesn’t pay much, but I enjoy it most of the time.
So, the teams in Florida that I will follow this season, because of a personal interest are:
* Lake Nona Lions – a 1st year school which will have no seniors, but will include one Derrick Mountford, one of my favorite young men in our youth group at church.
* Apopka Blue Darters – always a force in Orlando and class 6A, their center is Ryan Moran, the first born of my pal Kevin at Convergys.
* Rocky Bayou Christian Knights – while it is hard for a Crestview guy to pull for a school in Niceville, one of the Knights leading players will be senior Shawn Josey. The oldest offspring of cousin Mark, Shawn has been a pleasure to watch grow up and I really mean GROW! At 6’0 300, he is almost twice what any of us skinny boys were at his age.
* Baker Gators – I had cousins who went to Baker, but none that played on their storied football teams. Cousin Mark’s son Dakota will be making his presence known just north of Milligan this season.
* Crestview – I will always be a Bulldog and listen to as many games as I can each season via the internet.
* Fort Walton Beach – I lived about a mile away from the FWB campus while the school was being built, but my real interest comes from marrying into a family of Vikings. Too bad that they are in the same district as Crestview…
OK, I’ll go with some tips and games to watch in Florida this season, and then move on to the national scene in a few days. Fort Lauderdale St Thomas Aquinas is the defending 5A champ, and was the “national champ” as well, depending on the poll. Speaking of polls, Rivals, Prep Nation, Max Preps and USA Today are some of the big boys. STA will play 2 out of state teams this year. They open with an Ohio team in the Kirk Herbie event, and then in early October host Byrnes out of South Carolina. Byrnes has been dominant the last few years, spanking quality teams from Georgia and Florida. With super RB Marcus Lattimore, the Rebels will come to Florida confident. Lakeland has been probably the top team in FLA over the last 10 years, until STA CRUSHED them in the title game in December. Hopefully they will rebound, and represent Florida well, when they go out to California to play Concorde De LaSalle. Lakeland was good enough last year to spank a top Pennsylvania power, but no match for STA in Orlando.
In 6A, Miami Northwestern has been the team for 3 or 4 years, but were upset at the end of the title game, but Sanford Seminole. The Bulls look to rebound this season, but will have some good competition from Miami Central and Daytona Beach Mainland, who just happen to face off in week one in Daytona (I think I’ll be at that one) In 4A, Tampa Plant beat Lincoln last year. Lincoln always manages to be in the mix, but this season Niceville and Pace will pose a threat from the central time zone part of the state. Orlando Edgewater, a “magnet” school of sorts in Orange County, was always a 6A factor, and now have gone down to 4A in the recent reclassification. In fact, it is hard to keep up with all the changes from the reclass.
I plan on a discourse regarding the Private vs Public school teams in a week or two, but for now let me mention the 3 top private powerhouses, other than STA. In Jacksonville, Bolles plays at the 2A level and every year Corky’s team plays at least in the final 4. In Tallahassee, North Florida Christian rules, as does emerging power Jupiter Christian from down south. Those 2 teams hook up in Tallahassee for their Kickoff Classic on August 28 . I’ll be calling my bud Roger that night for the full scoop.
Here a few of the top games which pit Florida teams against out of state powers:
>Venice Indians go to Virginia to face reigning 6A champs Oscar Smith on 8/28 a TV game
>I already noted the 2 games that STA will play, one in Ohio and the other against Byrnes, both TV games.
>The Pace Patriots and the Niceville Eagles will tangle with Mobile area 6A power Daphne this season.
In my next entry, I’ll list the top KO Classics games from around the state. Other states have already started regular season play, so I’ll hit those highlights too. As I close out the first entry of my new blog, I’ll provide a few of my top resources for information:
http://flavarsity.rivals.com/ www.flavarsity.rivals.com this site is rich in smack talk and information from a lot of coaches from around the state. Look for FLOutlaw on the forums <
http://highschool.rivals.com www.highschool.rivals.com the national version of the site above, from it you can go to many other state sites, if you are truly a sick puppy like I am.
http://www.maxpreps.com/national/national.htm">http://www.maxpreps.com a California outfit that has a lot of good coverage, but some pretty weak rankings sometimes.
http://www.prepnation.com/">http://www.prepnation.com another great site, with pretty solid rankings.
Of course the FHSAA.org site is good, as are many of the other state sites
The USA Today does a decent job. The Atlanta paper (AJC.com) covers the entire state of Georgia, and the Nashville paper does a pretty good job in Tennessee. Alabama coverage is weak by their papers, they really make a fella work hard for information. Texas, now there is a state that loves their football. There is never a shortage of coverage or information out there.
FLOutlaw
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