Many teams in 1A were on a bye week in week eight including many ranked teams, however the week was not devoid of any drama.  Unlike other classifications 1A districts are much smaller and thus district play hasn’t even begun for a large portion of the classification as most district have four teams, but here is a breakdown of how some of the more important district games went last week and the races are shaping up.

- In District 2-1A DI, Nazareth beats Happy 22-20 in an amazingly exciting and low scoring game!  This game many feel would decide the playoff seeding for the district, but let’s not count out Petersburg (1-0) who had a key win over Lorenzo (60-51) two weeks ago, or Lorenzo (1-1) for that matter who stayed alive in the district race with a key win over Hart last week 57-20.

-In District 10-1A DI, Gholson defeated Abbott 34-8 in what might be the biggest surprise to those that follow six-man football.  The Wildcats are undefeated on the season (7-0) and looking to make an even bigger splash in the next few weeks!  They have a very talented player CJ Hutchison who racked up 277 yards and three TDs on 26 carries against Abbott.  Gholson’s big test this week will be against Blum.  Blum is sitting in the district’s driver seat right now at 2-0 with wins over Aquilla and Covington and a win over Gholson will all but synch them as district champions.  The Gholson v Aquilla game week 10 and the huge rivalry game between Aquilla and Abbott will be very critical games as well!

-Veribest won a critical District 13-1A DI game against Bronte at Bronte’s homecoming 52-24.  Bronte is now 0-2 in district play and technically not out of the race yet, but the Longhorns will need to beat 1-0 district favorite Robert Lee this week to have a chance.  Eden is 2-0 and will have a key final two games against Veribest and Robert Lee.

-Anton was victorious over Amherst 56-44 and Whitharral defeated Lazbuddie 45-0 as those two school both sit atop district three with 2-0 records.  This week’s Whitharral v Amherst game holds great significance in the district race for the two playoff spots.

-Buena Vista and Sierra Blanca both won their district five contests with BV handing Dell City their second district loss 60-12 and SB doing the same to Sanderson 45-38.  As it stands there is a three team bottle neck at the top with Grandfalls-Royalty also undefeated in district play.  This will be an exciting district race down the stretch and I wouldn’t doubt that point spread math may be a factor in deciding the two playoff spots.

-Brookesmith defeated Mullin 39-26 in an early must-win District 16-1A DII game.  The Mustangs now sit at 1-1 in district play and Mullin drops to 0-2.  Blanket is in the district driver seat at 2-0 with a win over Brookesmith and Sidney is 1-0 (idle last week) as they have a huge game against Brookesmith this week in what may decide a playoff spot.

Some 1A items were brought up in the recent UIL executive council meeting:

A group from 1A sized schools and coaches that play 11man football made a presentation to the UIL proposing that there be a separate 1A 11man football playoff bracket, much in the same way the UIL does with baseball.  The UIL decided to take no action on the issue and asked that the group go out and conduct more research and present their finding at a later date.  One other avenue this group has/is considering is a move to try to bring back 8-man football to Texas and in fact some of these schools have played 8-man JV games this season.  It will be interesting to see how things develop here.

Also the UIL accepted the recommendation of an AD Hoc committee on making changes to how 1A schools can count their enrollment numbers.  Previously schools had three options to count and could choose any of these ways: Grades 9-12, Grades 7-10, Grades 9-10 doubled

The change is now they MUST submit 9-12 and if their enrollment is over 104.9 they can use one of these alternatives to participate in 1A football (6man) if it brings them under the cut off:, Grades 8-11, Grades 7-10, Grades 9-10 doubled

However, those schools whose 9-12 is over will still be in class 2A in all other activities…and this is the major change as it was they were able to stay in 1A in everything before.