High School Football: Winners and Losers from Aug. 21-23

High school football has returned in full force and the second major weekend of game action didn’t disappoint. But the real story is more than just the final results. We’re looking at the players who stood out, the coaches who had a good start and the fans who are either celebrating or scratching their heads. We highlight the biggest winners and losers below – the people and moments that made the past week memorable from around the country.

WINNERS

Trinity League teams playing in Florida: For all the talk that it’s too hot and humid down in the Sunshine State for California high school football teams, they sure didn’t look like they had many issues compared to their counterparts on the field. Trinity League programs St. John Bosco, Mater Dei and Orange Lutheran all visited Florida and will return back home with victories.

The Braves had no problem dispatching Manatee a 31-0 rout and then the Monarchs, Lancers upended St. Thomas Aquinas and Miami Northwestern, respectively, on Saturday. It was quite the weekend for the Trinity League, proving it maintains the best league in the country bar none.

Folsom’s Ryder Lyons: If you were someone that stayed up super late on Saturday night to watch the nationally televised Folsom–Grant Union matchup out in California, you witnessed the Ryder Lyons Show. The BYU five-star commitment was unstoppable for the Bulldogs in their thrashing of the Pacers, with Lyons throwing for over 400 yards and accounting for five touchdowns in the win.

Lyons entered the season with high expectations and playing on a national stage showcased his talents in front of the entire country. Not that there’s really much else to prove for Lyons in his final year of high school football, but not many quarterbacks started their senior year like the Folsom star.

IMG Academy’s Greg Studrawa: When IMG Academy‘s 2024 season started last year, it wasn’t with a dominating performance. It was a rare Ascenders’ loss that kicked things off.

IMG Academy fell to Corner Canyon and moseyed their way to a 7-2 record, also losing to rival St. Frances Academy to cap the season. When you’re a team with talent like the Ascenders, that’s simply not good enough. The national program has looked like their dominant selves in the first two games under first-year head coach Greg Studrawa, leaning on a balance offense attack behind arguably the best offensive line unit in the land.

Blowout wins over The First Academy and Hoover might’ve been expected under Studrawa, though, they have seen crazier things happen like the aforementioned Corner Canyon game and the 2022 loss to Miami Central. It’s early and the Ascenders will see plenty of talented programs along the way, but this 2-0 start has been impressive under Studrawa’s watch so far.

LOSERS

South Florida high school football: We started off winners with the Trinity League’s success out on the East Coast and now we have to figure out what the heck is going on down in the 954 and 305. South Florida high school football teams, record wise, did not have the greatest showing against out-of-state or instate opponents.

It started on Thursday when The Bolles School routed Monarch, 34-15, and moved right into Friday with Utah’s Corner Canyon cruising by West Broward, 38-13. If not for victories by American Heritage, which needed an all-time comeback to defeat St. Joseph’s Prep School on Friday night, and Dillard beating Dr. Phillips, it would’ve been a 0-9 weekend for South Florida squads.

Has South Florida high school football begun to see some of its aura wither away? Whatever it is, this past week wasn’t the best for the area when it came to showcasing themselves against the state, country.

Gadsden County: You will see the theme is staying in Florida for this section because now a major state championship contender from last season is now already without their head coach.

According to a report by WCTV.com’s Alison Posey, Gadsden County is in search of a new head football coach as Russell Ellington has stepped down from the position and accepted a wide receivers coaching position at Savannah State.

The Jaguars are a program that just a year ago was in the midst of a 2024 season that would see them eventually competing for Florida’s Class 2A state championship. After Ellington and the school lost a recent appeal in a hearing last week with the Florida High School Athletic Association (FHSAA), Ellington is gone and now the Jaguars are left to look around for answers. Ellington had been allegedly accused of major recruiting violations by the FHSAA and was set to be suspended for the season and having to forfeit $5,000 of his salary.

What has happened at Gadsden County is a mess because the program scheduled an ambitious 2025 schedule, which includes national powerhouse East St. Louis on Sept. 6 on the road, Tallahassee Lincoln and The First Academy. Do the Jaguars still play those aforementioned games? Who leads them moving forward with such a difficult season ahead?

Naples and Sarasota Riverview coaches and players: Of the hundreds of games taking place around the country, good ole Mother Nature can always be counted on to rear its ugly head into them.

In this particular case when it comes to the Florida Friday night tilt between two-time state champion Naples and Sarasota Riverview, the game reached a 14-14 tie and then inclement weather became a factor. So much so that the game had to be called and the Golden Eagles, Rams finished with a tie.

When it comes down to the finish line of Florida’s deciding factor, which is computers/ratings, deciding where teams will be placed when heading into the playoffs, ties are really never helpful. We point this one out because this is just the start of high school football season in Florida, a state that’s seen numerous stoppages during the season because of weather events like major hurricanes, derail entire week’s worth of games.

Settling for a tie in our humble opinion certainly doesn’t bode well for teams when it comes to the latter parts of the season. Figuring out a winner and a loser in the end game, certainly helps playoff positioning. It would also help if the high school football season wasn’t smack dab in the middle of hurricane season as well.