Lonnie Flores enters his fifth year as the director of athletics for Orange County Public Schools, and the Michigan native said he is quite proud of the accomplishments of the teams and athletes under his purview.
Read more How a court-sanctioned Trump attorney became dean of FIU’s law school
During this past school year, Winter Park’s girls volleyball team won a repeat state championship, as did Lake Nona girls tennis. The East River girls bowling team won the state crown for the third year in a row.
Several teams were runners-up in the fight for state championships, like Jones football, Horizon boys volleyball, Ocoee girls and Evans boys in basketball, and even the Colonial cheerleading squad.
“We have teams at every school that are state-caliber teams and that is probably what I’m most proud of, that we’re really balanced across all FHSAA-sanctioned sports,” Flores said. “I’ve been ecstatic. I hold no punches. Sport for sport, across the state of Florida, Orange County has had competitive teams.
“I can go down our list of schools and we have a sport at virtually every one of our high schools that is a state-competitive team.”
Winter Park repeats as 7A girls volleyball state champion
Flores has enjoyed his time in charge of OCPS athletics. He grew up in a little town called Tecumseh, Mich., population about 9,000 people, and he attended Eastern Michigan University. He also served for 22 years in the Marine Corps before he entered into his career in education. Flores was formerly athletic director at Tohopekaliga and Liberty high schools in Osceola County.
Flores recently took time to discuss some topics of interest with the Orlando Sentinel, and one that has been foremost in the minds of a lot of people, especially football coaches, is the subject of the FHSAA’s newly established Independent League and Open Division.
The Independents
Flores was instrumental in creating the OCPS’s first independent football league from among its Metro Conference schools, separating nine schools — Colonial, Cypress Creek, East River, Freedom, Innovation, Lake Buena Vista, Oak Ridge, University and Windermere — from the other 14 Orlando schools and placing them in their own independent league.
The idea was to pull out the teams which had, in the past, struggled against the district’s traditionally strong teams, and create a more even playing field within which those nine schools would play each other.
There were skeptics at first, but after the two-year experimental period, all of the coaches were in agreement that the decision was a huge success. Those schools, however, were removed from FHSAA district play and did not have a shot at a traditional postseason tournament. That was the one drawback.
Now the FHSAA is borrowing a page from the OCPS playbook and has developed its own Independent League, within which OCPS teams can now vie for postseason qualification.
“I think it’s great. It’s an opportunity for our programs that are still growing to get to participate in a type of playoff scenario,” Flores said. “The FHSAA did a great job, and I’m happy with it. We’ve got a chance to get quite a few teams into the playoffs, and the travel is not too much for the teams still trying to build, so I think it’s a win all the way around.
“All of our independents have a good chance to be able to make the top eight in the North side of Pool A, and anything goes once you’re in the dance.”
After the experimental period, Windermere was allowed to pull away from its Independent schedule and East River was also offered some leeway, and the Falcons have rejoined FHSAA district play for this season. Eight OCPS teams remain independent.
“It’s an impossible task trying to make everyone happy,” Flores said. “The opportunities in this next two-year cycle with the opens and the traditionals, and in football, adding the independents, I think it opens more opportunities.
“A couple of years ago, I think a lot of people thought we were crazy to have eight teams go independent in football. And then two years afterward, I’m hearing people say, ‘Hey, that was a good decision.’ ”
Windermere shines as Independent
Windermere flourished in the Independent environs, winning every game in the two-year period and is riding a 20-game winning streak.
The success earned some fluctuation. This year, Windermere has been allowed to pull away from its independent schedule and add some high-caliber Orange County teams that are involved in traditional district play. Windermere will remain an Independent, but the schedule is far more difficult this season.
“Obviously, in the past cycle, we required our independent teams to play within an independent bracket,” Flores said of the format from the previous two experimental seasons, during which the Orlando independents, with the exception of East River, had to play each other, along with three non-independent games filling out the schedule.
This season, the Wolverines have added five 2025 playoff teams — Edgewater, Dr. Phillips, Lake Nona, St. Cloud and Winter Park — to their schedule and are only playing one OCPS independent team — Freedom.
“We believe Windermere is a great example of a team that has improved through that process, compared to where they were before that two-year cycle,” Flores said, “and we had no problem with Windermere being independent for another cycle, but we wanted to help them improve their schedule to maybe cross that bridge later to possibly move back into a district.
“(Windermere) has improved, but if you look at our districts across the board, we’ve got some pretty strong districts … and I did not want to slow the momentum of Windermere at this time.”
Read more Burned in a bombing in Gaza, a Palestinian teen finds healing with Jewish surgeon
The Open Division
THe FHSAA also created its new Open Division, which will place the top eight teams in the state, according to MaxPreps rankings, in their own playoff bracket at the end of the season. The other six classifications will also still have their own playoff brackets, and the Independent League will have a two-tiered “pool” tournament.
“The FHSAA did a good job of planning the Open Division and the way it would look with the double-elimination and the two brackets,” Flores said. “We would love to have one or two teams in the top eight, but football in Florida is very challenging, so it’s gonna be tough to be in those top eight schools.”
There are drawbacks to the Open 8. Like, for example, should a team like Lake Mary or Jones, state finalists a year ago, end up qualifying for the Open 8 playoffs, it’s likely they would be a lower seed and an underdog to win the state open title. Whereas, had they missed the cut for the top eight teams, they would certainly be one of the favorites to win one of the classification state titles, such as Lake Mary in 6A or Jones in 4A.
It’s also the same scenario for a team like Winter Park girls volleyball, the Class 7A state champions in each of the past two seasons. If this year goes the way the past two have gone, Winter Park would likely make the Open 8, instead of being favored to win another state title.
“I don’t see that as a drawback, because we’ve lost in state championship games the past couple of years, at different levels within classifications, to private schools, and it’s always something we know … that we could end up playing a private school in the state semifinals or finals,” Flores said. “So I don’t see it being any different if we end up playing them in the top eight. It’s an opportunity for a team that gets into that group to play the best teams in the state, regardless of classification.”
Addressing the transfers
Transfers have run amok, and there is no slowing down in sight. Orange County has had more than 100 football players transferring to different schools this offseason, and policing the legality of the transfers seems almost impossible.
The rumors of cheating with addresses and recruiting players have run rampant, but many schools do it. Flores, however, stands by the district’s enrollment department’s ability to legitimize the transfer paperwork.
“The paperwork has to be done at the enrollment office … and then the paperwork has to be submitted to the FHSAA and everything is verified. So, it’s a really clean process, at the end of the day,” Flores said. “It’s just that sometimes people perceive other things have happened, but the paperwork is going to be on the up-and-up before every kid is eligible to participate.”
When it was suggested that perhaps paperwork could be submitted with fake addresses or other false information, Flores said that he was unaware of any improprieties
“Not that I’ve seen, as far as fudged paperwork. A student is not signing that paperwork. A parent is completing that paperwork, and our office is doing a great job of verifying the paperwork. … They go above and beyond.”
The haves and have-nots
As the transfer era has taken over most of the offseason conversation, we watch as the rich get richer and the poor sit back and watch their numbers dwindle. Flores, however, said some of the numbers issues are not the result of transfers, alone.
“It’s an issue, kind of throughout the state, with the drop in numbers in student enrollment. That’s kind of where it starts and when it comes to school choice, it’s gotta be a family’s choice to make the educational decision that fits them,” Flores said of the statewide trend for families to start sending their children to private schools instead of public.
“I always caution any family I talk to about not making an educational choice on the belief of an athletic opportunity. Sometimes, when you talk about players moving, the grass isn’t always greener somewhere else.”
This past spring, Lake Buena Vista had to cancel its spring game because the roster was fewer than 30 players and it was difficult to practice, let alone face an actual opponent.
“It’s the ebbs and flows of changes and trying to get everybody into place and hiring a football coach late, that adds to all of that,” Flores said. “I think they’ve got a great football coach at Lake Buena Vista now, and it’s just gonna take some time to grow that program.”
LBV’s new coach is Sean Holmes, who spent the past two seasons at Bronson High, where he was 0-20.
“We’ve been there with plenty of programs. I laugh with people who have been in Orange County a lot longer than I have when they tell me that not too long ago, Edgewater had struggles. It seems like that was never the case … look where Edgewater is today,” Flores said. “It’s the product of public schools. You are gonna have times when you are up and times when you are down. People fret when the times are down and they forget where they were when things were looking up.”
But Innovation shines
Innovation, on the other hand, has done particularly well since opening in 2024.
“Innovation has been very impressive and I give a lot of credit to the principal, Mr. Chris Davis,” Flores said. “When he opened the school and his vision of how he was going to focus on school culture, hiring coaches on campus and working with teachers that he brought in who were willing to coach.
“The coaches have been awesome. I am so proud of the coaches over there and the efforts that have gone into building those programs.”
This past season, Innovation’s girls soccer team made the Class 5A final four and the football team went 8-2 in the independent league.
Read more More families in this city are using ‘cargo bikes’ to haul groceries and children
Chris Hays can be found on X.com @OS_ChrisHays.