UIL realignment
Every two years, the Texas University Interscholastic League, UIL, comes out with district pairings that must give coaches and school administrators gray hair. This year the new districts were announced Monday morning, February 1, 2010.
I pay fairly close attention to the West Texas districts as those are the districts I am most familiar with. For instance, what we used to call ‘the Little Southwest Conference’ does not exist anymore thanks to UIL re-disticting. That district used to be an extreme powerhouse. But it does not exist any more just like the Southwest Conference does not exist. By the way, those schools used to include Odessa Permian, Odessa High, San Angelo Central, Midland, and Abilene schools.
Now San Angelo will be playing schools in Amarillo and Lubbock.
Here is a link to the UIL realignment: Click Here
I also noticed Big Lake-ReaganCounty has dropped in classification from 2A to 1A and will be playing some familiar district games in football and some new district opponents in a different basketball district including Irion County. Strange huh?
That’s not as strange as a few years ago when Anthony was in the same district as Reagan County. It was a 600 mile round trip for a district game. Directions included go to mile marker -0- on I-10 past El Paso and turn left. The directions were accurate.
Back when I was a sportswriter/publisher, I used the UIL site frequently looking for starting dates for football practice, the dates for first games, and playoff brackets. So, you can use the site for the same purposes.
Big Spring has dropped into class 3A. So did Lampasas. Looks like Lampasas Coach Joey McQueen will be playing Jerry Vance over in Liberty Hill. Both coaches are old friends.
Realignment has always been an interesting time for Texas schools, and especially for schools out here in Real Texas, where the entire towns revolve around supporting the kids in whatever UIL activity they are involved in from band to academics, and yes, even a littIe football playin’.
If that means a 600 mile roundtrip for a game…….then that is what we do.
I’m David out in Real Texas
Just checkin’ my tires
{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
i dont think i will ever forget going to Anthony to play football. we went on a 24-hour round trip to play a district football game on a field that was within spittin’ distance of Juarez(that’s in Mexico, yall). i think the worst part was having the bus break down around Texon (less than ten miles from home). we were all ready to walk the rest of the way into town and might have if not for a quick fix by paul jones. and then there was the time in a little town called Tornillo, just east of El Paso, we played baseball on a field without a single blade of grass. hope those kids get to stay a little closer to home this time around
i seem to remember a trip to fabens in the early 60’s for a quarter-final or semi-final football game. there were no bleachers…we had to stand throughout the game. fun days!
You have a great memory Lou. We played Fabens (or maybe it was Canutillo in Fabens) and Tommy Franklin hit a great big ole lineman so hard, it knocked him up into the band.
Not that it is a big deal, but you mentioned all of the schools in the old 5 -A “Little Southwest Coference” except the Midland schools.
Hopefully saving you some grief.
Thanks you Mr. Kidder….the oversight has been corrected. I think by now everyone knows who Cedric Benson is and that he led Midland Lee to a couple of state championships. Would hate for Cedric to personally point out my oversight…..