Tune in to Varsity Sports Network Florida for the final 1-hour season wrap-up show!

One theme that will likely run through these final polls is how I analyze the entire resume, outside of an automatic #1/#2 ranking for the finalists. Quality wins are very important (as measured by relative positioning) and quality losses vs bad losses are also including in my thinking. The higher the ranking, the likely there are quality wins, and you will see that schools that are in the ‘Also Considered’ tend to not have the signature win that gets them ranked.

As usual, there are a lot of A beats B, who then beats C, and when C upsets B it causes deeper analysis. Put on top of that, you have plenty of instances of teams in the Top 10 playing each other three times.

Don’t get too hung up on the records of the teams. The FHSAA ranking system tends to overemphasize Won-Loss record and Strength of Schedule (SOS) is underweighted in my opinion. Other ranking agencies tend to overweight SOS in my opinion, so I’m more inclined to analyze the total resume, as mentioned above.

Congrats to Bartram Trail for righting the ship after some regular season struggles, as they take the 2A final over a surprising St. Thomas, upset winners over #1 seed Hagerty in the semifinals. STA earns the #2 slot automatically as a result.

Plant’s victory over Steinbrenner in the Region 3 final in 3OT’s was the upset of the brackets, and since I look at the full resume, including Steinbrenner’s regular season win by 9 goals, I still see Steinbrenner ahead of Plant. Hagerty would have been #2 if I didn’t automatically assign STA that for their final appearance, even with STA’s win over Hagerty. Hagerty’s total resume exceeded STA’s.

Vero Beach played the toughest schedule in 2A according to the FHSAA, but 5th in LN, which is an interesting insight into their differences. Lots of quality wins throughout the season but a really bad loss to Lake Mary. Two of the 5 losses were out-of-state.

Lake Mary, like Bishop Moore in 1A, was very difficult to assess. They did have a winning record, but 8 losses hurts, even against the state’s 5th toughest schedule for either class. What they did have was quality wins over Bartram and Vero Beach, and that improves their resume substantially. They also showed in 1 and 2 goal losses to Steinbrenner, Hagerty and St Thomas.

Steinbrenner only lost once in-state, the regional final game, and has a road win over LHP and a home win over Lake Mary, but much of the schedule was below the other teams. FHSAA had them as 15th in SOS in 2A, while LN had them 6th.

Plant was the upset darling of the bracket, gaining the Final Four bid, but Bartram won the semifinal game comfortably, so the late season run through Newsome, Gulf Coast and Steinbrenner was really more of a regional accomplishment than statewide.

The next grouping is kind of bunched up. LN has Region 3 teams at 8-11, with Newsome, Manatee, Gulf Coast and Riverview-Sarasota. Newsome lost one goal games to Manatee and Riverview and did not play Gulf Coast. Their best win was at Bishop Moore early in the season. Manatee split with Riverview (the loss was early), beat Gulf Coast and took the first round FHSAA bracket game vs Newsome, and lost by one goal to St. Stephen’s. Gulf Coast split with Community School (win was first game of the year), beat Riverview twice and lost to St. Stephen’s. In totality, I would give Manatee the slightest edge when it comes to these 4 teams.

FLN 2023 Girls 2A Final Top 10 Poll!

1) Bartram Trail (19-4)

2) St. Thomas (11-9)

3) Hagerty (20-5)

4t) Steinbrenner (14-3)

4t) Vero Beach (17-5)

6) Plant (18-4)

7) Lake Mary (14-8)

8) Manatee (13-5)

9) Newsome (15-5-1)

10t) Gulf Coast (13-5) / Riverview-Sarasota (12-8)

Also-Considered:

None