The Florida High School Athletic Association begins a new era this football season with a groundbreaking change in its state playoff format. After years of discussion and debate, the FHSAA created an Open Division that will pull eight elite teams out of the traditional playoff process and into a separate bracket.
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The FHSAA’s hope is that elevating dominant teams in football and 10 other sports into the Open brackets will create a more even playing field for its traditional state tournaments. The great eight will be selected based on rankings computed by MaxPreps.
Another new twist for the Open Division has pool play. That assures each team at least three games.
Some football coaches love the idea. Others dislike it. Many say they don’t really care because the addition of the Open Division should not affect them.
FHSAA’s Open Division playoffs set for 2026-27; 8 top-ranked teams collide
Scott Perry, who coached Lake Mary to the Class 7A state title in a wild thriller last December, has mixed feelings.
“I honestly don’t know what to think about. I’m not opposed to it,” Perry said. “I do think it would be unfair to get placed in an Open Division against like St. Thomas Aquinas or some of these private schools that have all that money and everything they got.
“With the caliber of the programs that have been winning, it’s hard to match up as a public school, because (privates) have so much money.”
Aquinas, a Fort Lauderdale Catholic school, has won a record 17 state championships, including seven in a row.
Proponents of the change say Florida’s school choice and open enrollment policies have given schools like Aquinas and Chaminade-Madonna of Hollywood (nine state titles) huge advantages in an era where the superpowers annually gain game-changing transfers.
Chaminade won seven titles in eight seasons before it lost 17-14 against another South Florida private school, Cardinal Newman of West Palm Beach, in last year’s Class 1A final.
Aquinas coach Roger Harriott said the Open Division doesn’t change anything for the Raiders.
“It’s business as usual for us,” he said.
Aquinas has won 10 titles in three different classes under Harriott, a former Raiders player who also won a title at Nova Southeastern University School in Fort Lauderdale (2012).
Jones High of Orlando reached the 4A championship game the past two seasons and lost both times to another South Florida private school power, American Heritage-Plantation, which has won six titles.
Jones coach Elijah Williams said the possibility of having a playoff path that would not include American Heritage would not matter to Tigers fans.
“Our fan base wants a state title, because we ain’t never won one. So they don’t care about that,” Williams. “I believe you ain’t no state champion if you ain’t playing Broward or Dade County teams. There’s always some Miami team. To win state you gotta go through a lot of good teams.”
But if Jones makes the Open 8, it would reduce its chances to win a state championship trophy in that loaded bracket.
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“It’s rewarding to be in the top eight in Florida, but at the end of the day, you want to win a state championship,” Williams said. “And if we go 10-0, we already know we’re gonna make the top eight.”
DeLand coach Rick Darlington is not a fan of the change for that very reason.
He points out that if DeLand has the No. 1 power ranking in the large-school class (now 6A) at the end of the regular season it would be a favorite to win a state title. But if they are ranked in the top eight they would be pulled into the Open Division, likely as an underdog.
“It’s not fair to teams like us, Edgewater and Jones, who have never won a state title. And think about how close Jones and Edgewater have been. So now, to finally have that team that can win it, and you get thrown in there with St. Thomas and Chaminade and American Heritage and Venice and Lakeland,” Darlington said.
MaxPreps published a preseason ranking of the Top 100 teams in the nation. It included returnees, transfers and other factors. If the nine teams on that list hold their positions, the 2026 Open bracket would have, in order, Aquinas, Carol City of Miami, American Heritage, Chaminade, Miami Central, West Boca, Cardinal Mooney and Lakeland. DeLand would be No. 9.
DeLand, which lost to Lake Mary in a 7A quarterfinal last year, returns 18 senior starters and has one of the best running backs in the state in junior Taihj Moore.
“Let’s just win our class, and then maybe after you’ve won your class, take the top four highest-ranked teams that won state and have them play for two more weeks,” Darlington suggested. “So then you can still have Edgewater state champion and Edgewater Open Division champion.”
Darlington and Williams agree that the Open 8 should be only for teams that have previously won state championships.
Last season, five of the seven champions above the Rural Division had previously won titles, including Aquinas and American Heritage. It was the fourth for Raines of Jacksonville, third for Cardinal Mooney of Sarasota, and second for West Boca Raton. The two first-timers were Lake Mary and Cardinal Newman.
West Boca was the only first-time champ in 2024.
Darlington is on the FHSAA’s football coaches advisory committee, which discussed the Open concept and made recommendations to the association’s staff and board of directors, which approved the Open Division plan in June by a 10-0 vote.
“We said, ‘You have to have won a state title in the last 10 years to be considered (for the Open 8),’ but someone up above us took that out,” Darlington said. “For us, I don’t like it. For someone like St. Thomas, I think it is absolutely necessary.”
There is another concern. Will highly-ranked teams who want to avoid being bumped to the Open 8 consider throwing a game? Would a team bench starters to tank and drop in the rankings?
“Oh I’m pretty sure some teams will do that. The NBA does it all the time,” Williams said. “But not me. I can’t take no L. I ain’t built like that.”
There is also some fear that the traditional classification brackets (1A through 6A this year) will be seen as watered down tournaments with less meaning.
“People will say that,” Perry said. “If I’m the one who wins, then I would say that I won the ones they put in front of me. That’s all you can control. But the ones who are jumping up to the Great 8 or whatever you call it, the Open Division, if they don’t win they could be like, ‘Well, we would have won our division.’ So there will be talk like that no matter what you do.”
Darlington said winning a state title won’t be tainted.
“If we win a state title, I don’t care what anyone says about how we didn’t play this team or that. The ring is still shiny,” Darlington said.
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Chris Hays can be found on X.com @OS_ChrisHays.