Okay, a few things to note. First, it’s only three weeks, and as we’ve all seen, mathematics gets better with more data, and there isn’t a lot of it yet, so don’t get upset at this first pass. Take this as the ‘spring training’ of power rankings and use it to familiarize yourself with the process.

What you will see is four regions, with Boys 1A and 2A, and Girls 1A and 2A in each section for that region. The rules in place for the FHSAA this year are different than last year. This year, the District winners are NOT guaranteed a Top 4 seed in a region. There will be 8 teams in each region and each District winner is only guaranteed a slot in the 8 teams. If a District winner is 8th-ranked in the Top 8, that is where they will be placed. What doesn’t change for that is that if they are matched up with a non-district winner in Round One, they will get the home game. We’ll point that out in the spreadsheet where it appears. But also note that the FHSAA does have final say over a location for a game, so they do have the power to move a location if they deem it in the best interest of the matchup. And example might be if the distance between the schools is so big that a neutral site makes sense, but they will only do this in unusual circumstances, so assume the home game will be as slotted.

After the first round, re-seeding occurs and the top team in the matchup gets the home game. Finally, in the Final Four, we will get the #1 vs #4 and #2 vs #3 matchup.

The FHSAA publishes the rankings on their website under the Rankings (B) and Rankings (G) tabs, and those can be reconfigured and sorted. That is how we do these brackets.

For the purpose of these ‘prediction brackets’, we assume the highest ranked team in each District is the winner of the District. It’s just a starting point, so don’t fret for now. We found last year that Won/loss record tended to work early and as the season went on, Strength of Schedule played more and more of a factor. It’s fair to say that the MaxPreps data is most of the calculation, but please note that MaxPreps is NOT a full national database, since many ‘power’ programs do not bother with it. So you will not see a St. Thomas/Boys’ Latin score impact the ranking of St. Thomas much, if at all.

Which means, to those of you who have not heard FLN talk about this before . . . Do Not Take MaxPreps National Rankings seriously if you are broadcasting or reporting on a game. We are WAY ahead of other states in scheduling games and some states have not played a game yet, including many of the Northeast power programs. And many DO NOT PARTICIPATE anyhow. Just use the MaxPreps stats for Florida comparisons ONLY.

Okay, off the soapbox. But any commentator using the national rankings will be disdained . . . okay, soapbox off and I mean it! As a check on the early MaxPreps math, I also included an outside ranking approach by Laxnumbers.com.

If you are among the First Four Out, you can check where you are compared to the last team in. So, when you look at Region 1, Girls 2A, you will see Apopka at #8 with a ranking of 30, while Gulf Breeze, the first team out, is at 32. That gives you an idea of how close you are to making the Bracket.

To read the First Four Out, the first row of numbers are where they stand in the FHSAA ranking, while the next four numbers are where Laxnumbers has them. Obviously, there are some real differences between the two, and that gets to how much more Laxnumbers uses Strength of Schedule early in the process.

Here’s Region One:

Obviously, the first round sets up as #1 vs #8, #2 vs #7, #3 vs #6 and #4 vs #5

In Boys 1A, South Walton wins District 2 but does not get the home game since Bolles is also a District winner. But in Girls 1A, Pensacola Catholic would get the home game since they are the District 1 winner versus a runner-up Bolles in District 2.

Now that you see how it works, here’s the other 3 Regions:

Region 2

We’ll be on Varsity Sports Network next week with the next edition, so tune in!