Manatee football may head to New Jersey or Texas

Manatee's run to the Class 5A state championship game put the storied program back on the national radar.
It may have put the program on the road, too.
Hurricanes assistant coach Chris Conboy said Manatee is in talks to possibly head to New Jersey next season to play either traditional Garden State powers Don Bosco Prep or Bergen Catholic.
Don Bosco not only won the state's Non-Public Group 4 State Championship, but the Ironmen, who hail from Ramsey, also won the national championship by finishing first in the RivalsHigh 100 final poll.
Helping the Ironmen's cause was the Hurricanes knocking off then-No. 1 Fort Lauderdale St. Thomas Aquinas in the Class 5A state semifinals. Manatee finished the year ranked 26th, while Aquinas, the national champ in 2008, was 27th.
The Canes could also head to Texas to face Abilene, which went 15-0 and won Texas' Division II state championship. The Eagles finished fifth in the nation.
Manatee went 13-2, reaching the state title game for the first time since 1993 and sixth time overall.

Brock's selflessness boosts Manatee

Kevin Cassidy needed a goalie.
So Manatee's girls soccer coach fired an email off to Alyssa Brock, one of his seniors, asking her if she was interested.
Her response?
"I'll do whatever you need me to do, coach."
Brock has done plenty, recording 89 saves and three shutouts for the Hurricanes (10-7-1), who play for the Class 5A-District 10 title tonight at Venice.
Manatee's goalie the past few years, Tina Papazian, is hoping to go to med school, and declined to play this season so she could focus more on academics and internships.
That put Brock in between the pipes, and the plan has worked.
"She's a fantastic goalie," Cassidy said.
During Wednesday's semifinal against Naples Gulf Coast, Brock had eight saves, keeping Manatee in the game and allowing the Canes to score a 3-2 win in double overtime.
Brock was also the most vocal in the team huddles, as well.
"Alyssa is a fantastic kid," Cassidy said.
The one downfall of putting Brock in goal is it robs Manatee of one of its better scorers. Cassidy took Brock out of the net during Senior Night, and she responded by scoring twice.
That said, putting Brock in goal has been a boon for Manatee, which has already advanced to next week's regional tournament.
"If I'm a business owner," Cassidy said, "I'm hiring her."

Saint Stephen's Watts headed to Defiance

A.J. Watts, a pitcher at Saint Stephen's, will play college baseball at Defiance College, a Division III school in Ohio.
Watts went 4-1 with a 2.41 in helping the Falcons win a district title last year.
"Defiance is exactly what I was looking for in a college," Watts said.
Defiance competes in the Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference.

Carnes, Sanders hitting recruiting trail hard

With National Signing Day two weeks away, Manatee's Brion Carnes and Ace Sanders are squeezing in all the info they can before making a final decision.
Carnes, a quarterback, has not rescinded his verbal commitment to USF in the wake of coach Jim Leavitt's firing. However, he is visiting Nebraska this weekend and Western Kentucky next weekend. Cincinnati and Oregon have also turned up the heat since Leavitt's dismissal, and are trying to have Carnes visit next week, said Chris Conboy, Manatee's quarterbacks coach.
Western Kentucky has local ties in head coach Willie Taggart and defensive line coach Raymond Woodie, the former head coach at Bayshore and Palmetto.
Sanders hasn't committed anywhere and visited USF last weekend. Conbody said Sanders, a wide receiver, heads to South Carolina this weekend and West Virgina next weekend.
Signing Day is slated for Wednesday, Feb. 3.

Scott to join Woodie at WKU

Palmetto defensive back Ty Scott will be joining Raymond Woodie at Western Kentucky.
According to rivals.com and the Louisville Courier-Journal, Scott committed to the Hilltoppers last weekend - not long after Woodie, who coached Palmetto for four seasons, left the Tigers to become the Hilltoppers' new defensive line coach.
This could be one of several Manatee County players to head to WKU, which has ties to the area in not only Woodie, but head coach Willie Taggart, who played football at Manatee.
Scott is the second Palmetto football player expected to sign a Division I letter-of-intent on National Signing Day, joining defensive end Kerchal Byrd Jr., who has committed to Tulane.

Woodie's run a good one

Raymond Woodie is off to coach the defensive line at Western Kentucky, putting a close to a four-year tenure as Palmetto's football coach that can't be classified as anything but successful.
Woodie posted a winning record (26-17) and averaged over six wins a year, all the while keeping Palmetto in the playoff hunt each fall.
The Tigers went 4-6 in 2006, Woodie's first year, nearly making the playoffs before losing in a three-way tiebreaker. In '07, they got off to a 7-0 start - a run triggered by Palmetto's first win over Southeast in 15 years during Week 1 - en route to a 9-3 record and the Class 3A-Region 3 semifinals.
Though the '08 Tigers were upset by upstart Braden River during the first round of the regional playoffs, Palmetto went 8-3 and won a district title for the first time in nine years.
And this past fall, the Tigers shook off an 0-3 start and nearly made the playoffs before a wrenching loss to Lakewood Ranch in Week 9. Palmetto finished 5-5 despite losing 15 starters from the year before, giving Woodie three winning seasons out of four at his alma mater.
Meanwhile, Tigers such as Joe Hills (South Carolina), Damian Copeland (Louisville) and Kedric Johnson (Florida) signed Division I scholarships. Kerchal Byrd Jr. has committed to Tulane, and Brandon Tarpley, considered one of the best kickers in the country, is being courted by a number of Division I suitors and will be probably be headed somewhere come National Signing Day.
Palmetto is in better shape now than it was before Woodie joined the program, a delight to not only the school, but whomever is appointed to serve as Woodie's successor.

Basketball needs a county tournament

Bradenton Christian's boys basketball team can lay claim to being the champion of the Smoothie King Classic tournament.
But are the Panthers the champions of Manatee County?
Perhaps.
The boys tournament, which was played during the last week of December at BCS, included all but one Manatee County team - Saint Stephen's, which takes a 4-3 record into Thursday's home game with Tampa Bay Christian, was absent - and used Out-of-Door Academy to round out the field.
Would the Falcons have made a difference? Maybe. Maybe not. No one will ever know.
But the Class 1A Panthers did play a sound tournament. After beating ODA in the first round, they outlasted Class 4A Braden River in the semifinals and knocked off Class 5A Manatee in the finals after by trailing by as many as 20 points in the third quarter.
And keep in mind the Panthers haven't lost to a Manatee County team since the 2006-07season, and defeated county foes such as Palmetto and Manatee last year.
So it wouldn't be a stretch to call BCS the best boys basketball team in Manatee County. That being said, however, it would be nice to see a bona fide county championship.
Pick a gym. Pick a weekend. Have a coaches meeting to determine the seeding, and play it out.
It's doable.
Volleyball does it. Golf does it. Cross country does it. Wrestling does it. Track and field does it. Swimming does it. And beginning last fall, football did it with the six public schools.
So why not basketball? As we saw at Bradenton Christian last week, eight-team tournaments can be run efficiently. And unlike holiday tournaments, where all teams are guaranteed three games regardless of how they do in the first one, the county tournament could be a one-and-done affair.
Win and move on. Lose and head home. If you want the two teams that lost in the semifinals to play a third-place game, so be it.
With the Florida High School Athletic Association deciding not to pare down the schedules, and basketball teams retaining their maximum 25 games, there is time and space to do something like this.
Getting a good crowd won't be a problem, with all eight teams bringing their share of supporters.
Holiday tournaments are great. But it would be nice, at least once, to give a true-blue county championship a try.