There will be tri-county high school football championships this year. Here are details
The long-discussed South Florida high school football championships are becoming reality this year and most of the details are finally in place, complete with a series of rankings to determine postseason fields for the upcoming tournaments.
The tri-county championships — pitting teams from across Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties against one another — will kick off next month with six postseason brackets based on school sizes and a rankings system devised by media members across the Miami metropolitan area. It’s an on-the-fly, exciting postseason format pieced together in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The panel of media members: Miami Herald sports reporter David Wilson, Sun-Sentinel high school sports beat writer Adam Lichtenstein, The Palm Beach Post sports content editor Phillip Suitts, longtime Florida high school sports guru Larry Blustein, and Herald contributors Bill Daley and Dave Brousseau. Daley and Brousseau are co-chairmen of the rankings committee.
Every public school from across the three counties will be eligible, with the exceptions of Palmetto, Homestead, Miami Central, Northwestern and Edison, all of whom decided to opt into the Florida High School Athletic Association’s state series, and a handful of other independents from Miami-Dade County. Most private-school powerhouses — including reigning state champions St. Thomas Aquinas, Chaminade-Madonna and Champagnat Catholic — will not participate, instead playing for FHSAA state titles.
For the tri-county championships, teams from all three counties are divided into three divisions — one for teams usually in Class 8A, one for teams usually in Class 7A and one for teams usually in Florida’s six smallest classifications — and each division will hand out two tri-county titles. The “Gold Championships” will include the top two teams from Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties, plus two at-large teams, and the “Silver Championships” will include the next two teams from each county, plus two more at-large berths.
The playoff teams will be determined through rankings, put together by reporters across the Miami metro area. A top 16 for each division will update every Tuesday through the end of the regular season.
The regular season will conclude the weekend of Nov. 20 with all teams having a bye the weekend of Nov. 27 — the week of Thanksgiving — ahead of the start of the postseason.
Playoffs will run throughout December, concluding Dec. 21 and 22 with tri-county championships played at a to-be-determined site. Teams that miss out on the playoffs will be able to schedule games the first weekend of the postseason and teams eliminated in the quarterfinals will get to play the weekend of the semifinals.
Here’s the initial batch of rankings, which only includes teams eligible for the tri-county tournaments:
Class 8A
- Columbus (3-0); 2. Western (1-0), 3. Deerfield Beach (0-0), 4. South Dade (2-0), 5. Park Vista (2-0), 6. Palm Beach Gardens (1-1), 7. Monarch (2-0), 8. Stoneman Douglas (2-0), 9. Boca Raton (2-0), 10. Coral Gables (2-0), 11. Palm Beach Central (0-1), 12. Jupiter (2-0), 13. Forest Hill (1-0), 14. Flanagan (2-0), 15. Coral Springs (1-1), 16. Miami (1-2). Also considered: Coral Glades, Cypress Bay.
Class 7A
- Plantation (1-1), 2. Atlantic (1-1), 3. Miramar (1-0), 4. Dwyer (2-0), 5. Blanche Ely (2-0), 6. South Plantation (1-1), 7. Royal Palm Beach (1-1), 8. Fort Lauderdale (0-1), 9. American (2-1), 10. Palm Beach Lakes (0-1), 11. North Miami (2-1), 12. McArthur (0-2), 13. Olympic Heights (1-1), 14. South Broward (0-1), 15. Hialeah (0-2), 16. Seminole Ridge (0-1). Also considered: Cooper City, West Boca Raton.
Classes 6A-1A
- Killian (2-0), 2. Dillard (1-0), 3. Glades Central (2-0), 4. North Miami Beach (2-1), 5. Booker T. Washington (0-2), 6. Hallandale (1-0), 7. Norland (1-2), 8. Carol City (1-2), 9. Coconut Creek (2-0), 10. Pahokee (1-1), 11. South Miami (2-0), 12. Suncoast (1-1), 13. Stranahan (0-1), 14. Jackson (0-2), 15. Boynton Beach (1-1), 16. Southridge (0-3).Also considered: Coral Springs Charter.
Athletes signing Wednesday
▪ American Heritage: Tatyana Wyche (Florida) girls’ basketball; Taliyah Wyche (Florida) girls’ basketball.
▪ Blanche Ely: Ja’Leah Williams (Miami) girls’ basketball.
▪ Cardinal Gibbons: Emily Jimenez (Monmouth) girls’ basketball; Sharale McCormick (Flagler) girls’ basketball; Sophia Zinn (Louisville) girls’ soccer; Maddie Young (Florida) girls’ soccer; David Rossow (Miami) baseball; Benjamin Petri (Virginia) baseball.
▪ Calvary Christian: Nick Anello (Miami) baseball; Sean Ambrose (FIU) baseball; Alex Ulloa (Oklahoma State University) baseball; Rene Lastres (Florida) baseball; Irving Carter (Miami) baseball; Kyle Tako (Gulf Coast University) baseball; Brandon Delaphena (Georgetown) baseball; Ty Hollandsworth (Hillsborough College) baseball; Andrew Painter (Florida); Jonathan Lane (North Alabama University).
▪ Doral Academy: Devin Carter (South Carolina) , boys’ basketball; Amanda Ramirez (Pittsburgh) softball.
▪ Miami Country Day: Andrea Daley (George Washington) girls’ basketball.
▪ St. Thomas Aquinas: Samara Spencer (Arkansas) girls’ basketball, Arkansas.
▪ Westminster Academy: Emma Walhoff (Southern Miss) girls’ basketball.
▪ Westminster Christian: Saskia Hernandez (N.C. State) girls’ volleyball.
Bowling
▪ TERRA d. Columbus 2,962-2,777 — TERRA: Alex San Jose 206; Gianfranco Caro 222 game, 630 series; Casey Puett 266, 649; Ryan Toffoli 279, 692 series. Columbus: Alejandro Johnson 208 game; Chris Ferrer 212 game, 616 series; Marlon Ruiz 226 game.
Girls’ volleyball
▪ Mourning d. Krop (25-23, 24-26, 25-15, 25-22): Mila Cvetkovski 13 kills, 20 digs; CiCi Rivera 16 kills, 6 digs; Cristy Montes 25 digs.
This story was originally published November 11, 2020 at 10:59 AM.
