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THE CZECH IS IN THE MAIL
Every two years this happens.
The University Interscholastic League redraws classifications, districts and regions every other year. When it comes to the basketball districts, the UIL actually did a good job this time around.
Elgin, Bastrop and Cedar Creek remained in Districts 23 and 24-5A, respectively, in basketball. Six of the current 23-5A members — Elgin, Georgetown, Connally, Hendrickson, Pflugerville and Weiss — stayed in the district, with Georgetown East View moving up to 6A.
New members of 23-5A will be Leander Glenn and Manor. This will renew the Elgin-Manor rivalry.
Bastrop and Cedar Creek remain in 24-5A with schools from the Austin Independent School District. Their Austin ISD counterparts are Anderson, Crockett, Liberal Arts and Science Academy, McCallum, Navarro and the girls-only Ann Richards Academy.
In football, Elgin and Bastrop stayed together with Crockett, Navarro and LASA, who plans on playing varsity football after a two-year independent hiatus, as members of 12-5A-Division II. The district has six teams instead of eight as former members Connally and McCallum moved up to 5A-Division I and Liberty Hill moved into a different 5A-DII district.
Cedar Creek is still in a district of nine with current district mates Anderson, Lehman and Lockhart, as well as newcomers Boerne Champion, Manor, McCallum, Seguin and two-time defending state champion Smithson Valley. The other five teams in the current 12-5A-DI — A&M Consolidated, College Station, Hays, Hendrickson and Weiss — either moved into another district or moved up to 6A.
The Classes 5A-A football districts are crazy. But that’s expected when you insist on splitting each of those classifications into two divisions.
If you’re going to have 12 state champions, you need to have 12 different classifications. But I’ll save that for another time.
When it comes to regions, the UIL actually did some good things. In 4A, the Austin area schools are back in Region IV, while Houston area schools — Needville, Columbia and La Marque, to name a few — are finally in Region III.
It’s a good idea to keep schools in the same metropolitan or geographic area in the same regions. The UIL didn’t completely adhere to that practice.
In 6A and 5A, the governing body of Texas high school athletics and activities continues to put 4-6 Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW) area districts in Region I with schools from El Paso and West Texas, while putting the remaining schools in Region II with schools from East Texas, Central Texas or Greater Houston.
Since there are more than eight districts of DFW area schools in 6A and 5A, it would make sense to have an all-DFW area region and put the remaining DFW area schools in another region.
Region III-6A was a prime example of fixing something that isn’t broken. Instead of putting eight Houston area districts in the region, the UIL put seven districts from that area with an Austin area district.
Hutto happens to be in that district. The Hippos are in the same league with five Leander district schools and Georgetown East View, and these schools will be paired with ones from Cypress, Richmond, Rosenberg and Waller in the first round of the playoffs.
If the track and field, tennis, cross country and golf districts and regions are the same, Hutto athletes will travel to the Houston area instead of Austin or San Antonio to compete for the right to go to state. To add insult to injury, the other two Austin area 6A districts are in Region IV — 25 and 26-6A.
It would make more sense in 6A to have an all-DFW region, an all-Houston region, and a region with the ninth DFW area district, the three Austin areas, Central Texas and the three remaining Houston area districts. The fourth region can be a piecemeal of the El Paso, West Texas, four San Antonio/ Laredo area and two Rio Grande Valley districts.
In 5A, putting the six Houston area districts in the same region with the two Austin areas wasn’t the worst move in the world. Neither was putting the three San Antonio area districts in the same region with the three RGV and the Laredo and Corpus Christi areas.
Splitting DFW was the problem. It would’ve made more sense to have Region II be all-DFW area; Region I could be a combination of the two El Paso, two West Texas, two Austin area and two remaining DFW area districts; Region III would be six Houston area, East Texas and Central Texas; and Region IV as is.
It’s like building a puzzle. You build regions based on metropolitan or geographic areas and you piecemeal the rest of the classification accordingly.
This way, you can have the right districts and the right regions.
Chlapek is the Area Editor of the Elgin Courier and Taylor Press. He can be reached at [email protected].
