Prep football: Why Manatee is staying home and Palmetto is hitting the road

(photo by Grant Jefferies)

Trent Miller and the Palmetto Tigers have some traveling to do Friday.

The Manatee Hurricanes do not.

Both local teams are playing for regional championships Friday, but they'll be doing so roughly 130 miles apart. The Tigers head to Immokalee for the Class 5A-Region 3 title game while the Hurricanes host Fort Pierce Central for the Class 7A-Region 3 crown.

Why?

It's how the Florida High School Athletic Association set it up, that's why.

This year, the FHSAA ruled the team listed on the top line of each regional final bracket will host the championship game.

There are two exceptions. The first one is if the team on top is a district runner-up and the team on the bottom line is a district champion, the champion hosts. And the other wrinkle is if both finalists are district champs, and the team on the bottom was on the road for the regional semifinal and the team on top was not, the bottom team gets to hosts.

Such is the case for Palmetto. The Tigers hosted Auburndale in the first round and Wauchula Hardee in the second round, while Immokalee, a district champion, had to travel to Cape Coral for a regional semifinal.

Had Cape Coral won last week, the Tigers would be home.

As for the Canes, they knew they'd be at Hawkins Stadium on Friday regardless of who won the other semifinal. Fort Pierce Central is a district champ, but was home during the first two rounds. Fort Pierce's opponent last week, Stuart Martin County, was a district runner-up, and would have had to come to Manatee, which won its district, had Martin County won.