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FHSAA releases football playoff brackets

By Randy Lefko Sports Editor
Posted 10/21/20

GAINESVILLE - With the COVID pandemic affecting schedules throughout the state, the Florida High School Athletic Association has released the regional playoff brackets with November 6 to be the start …

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FHSAA releases football playoff brackets


Posted

GAINESVILLE - With the COVID pandemic affecting schedules throughout the state, the Florida High School Athletic Association has released the regional playoff brackets with November 6 to be the start date with Play-In games to open the tournament schedules.
One guy that likes the set up is Middleburg High coach Karl Smeltzer who is slated to travel to unbeaten Pensacola Escambia (4-0) in their playoff opener with 6A strongholds Robert E. Lee (4-0) and St. Augustine (3-2) to possibly follow with an upset.
“We probably drew the toughest route into the playoffs with Pensacola Escambia our first game, but I think we are going to be a very dangerous team by the time the playoffs start,” said Smeltzer, after a grueling 30-27 loss to an also much-improved Orange Park team on Friday. “We have eight sophomore that are starting, but this team went from a 35-0 loss to Ridgeview one week to a 34-27 loss two weeks later to them that came because of a late turnover. We are slowly cleaning up that stuff and, I have said before, this is a fun group to coach because they play hard from start to finish. We clean up the mistakes and we could upset some people down the line.”
Playoff games; starting with Play-in Games for lower seeded teams, will begin November 13 and run through six rounds of play to December 17-19 where the state championships will be played at Gene Cox Stadium in Tallahassee for Classes 1A-3A on Dec. 10-12 and at a to-be-determined site Dec. 17-19 for Classes 4A-8A.
After this summer’s series of meetings designed to form a policy for the 2020 season with regard to teams able or unable to play games in their respective regions, the FHSAA determined that any team that dones does not qualify for the FHSAA state tournament may compete in a post season bowl game after the regular season schedules are completed.
According to the FHSAA rules and regulations, there will be no district champions for 2020, but all teams who remain in the state tournament will earn a playoff spot.
The game draws and opponent selection will be via a blind draw; not won/lost records.
For Classes 1A-4A, which includes Keystone Heights, if more than eight teams competed in the regular season, a play-in game will be schedule with lower seeded teams playing each other to fill the 8-team bracket.

For 5A-8A, which is all the Clay County public high schools, 16 teams will fill the region bracket with seeds 16 and 17 to play play-in games. Home teams were determined by a coin flip.
In Class 4A, Region 1, Keystone Heights will travel to Bradford County for their regoin opener on Nov. 13. Opposite the Indians, Palatka will travel to South Sumter.
On the upper side of the Region 2 bracket, Bolles hosts The Villages and West Nassau hosts Fernandina Beach.
In 2019, Bolles won the region final over Bradford before losing the Class 4A championship to Booker T. Washington. Keystone Heights lost their region opener to Astronaut 34-14.
There are no Play-In games for region 2-4A.
In Class 5A, Orange Park (2-4) will travel Citrus High (1-3) on November 13 for their Play-In game with the Raiders having Menendez above them in the bracket. Orange Park will play Menendez on October 30 in a scheduled season matchup.
In the opposite bracket to Orange Park is North Marion (0-4) at Belleview (0-4) and Dunnellon (3-0) at Eastside (0-4) on Thurs., Nov. 12 at Citizen’s Field.
In the adjoining 5A region bracket, where Ridgeview and Clay reside, the Panthers (5-1) will travel to Tavares (3-1) in their opener on November 13 while Clay (5-0) hosts Leesburg (0-3) in their opener.
Opposite Ridgeview is Crystal River (1-2) at Vanguard (3-0) while Clay’s second opponent will come from Atlantic High (0-4) at Lake Weir (1-2). Vanguard is a region finalist from 2019; losing to Jones High 37-14. Atlantic High was a region semifinalist.
In Class 6A, Middleburg (0-6) will travel to Pensacola Escambia (4-0) for their November 13 game. Opposite the Broncos is St. Augustine (3-2) hosting Mosley (Lynn Haven) (3-2). On the upper end of the region bracket, Robert E. Lee (4-0) hosts Fort Walton Beach (2-2) and Pace (1-2) will host the winner of Booker T. Washington (Pensacola) (2-2) hosting Milton (4-0).
In 2019, Lee, who beat St. Augustine in the quarterfinals, lost in the region finals to Escambia, 39-13.
In Class 7A, Fleming Island (5-1) opens hosting Tate High (1-3) on November 13 with the Golden Eagles to travel to Tallahassee Chiles (1-2) in round two on November 20 with a win. Chiles drew a BYE.
At the opposite end of the bracket, First Coast (2-2) will host Tallahassee Lincoln (2-1) and Atlantic Coast (2-3) will host Fletcher (4-1).
In the bottom of the region bracket, Leon (0-2) and Navarre (3-0) drew BYEs with Niceville (4-0) to host Crestview (1-3) and Creekside (4-2) to host Buchholz (3-1). Leon will host the winner of the Niceville game with Navarre to host the winner of the Creekside game.
In 2019, Fleming Island lost to Niceville in the region semifinals. Lincoln also lost in the region semifinals; to state runnerup Edgewater. Chiles lost to Niceville in their region quarterfinals. Niceville lost to Edgewater in the region finals.
In Class 8A, Oakleaf (4-2) will host Nease (1-4) in a region opener on November 13 with Bartram Trail (5-1), West Port (3-1) and Spruce Creek (3-2) drawing BYEs and playing in the region semifinals on November 20. An Oakleaf win will put the Knights back against Bartram Trail for the region semifinals. Opposite the Knights, West Port (3-1) will host Spruce Creek (3-2).
In 2019, Bartram Trail beat Spruce Creek in the region opener, but lost in the region semifinals to Apopka, the eventual state champion.