Friday night’s Open Division playoff slate opens with a familiar heavyweight matchup: Lakeland heading to St. Thomas Aquinas in Fort Lauderdale.
The two programs meet again in a rematch of last year’s FHSAA Class 5A state championship game, when St. Thomas Aquinas blanked Lakeland 29-0. This time, the stakes come with Florida’s inaugural eight-team Open Division format, and both teams are slotted into Pool A alongside Chaminade-Madonna and Venice.
The game is set for Friday, Nov. 13 at 7:00 p.m. ET at Brian Piccolo Memorial Stadium, with the action available on NFHS Network.
St. Thomas Aquinas comes in as the No. 1 overall seed in Pool A and gets the first shot at setting the tone.
The Raiders open with Lakeland, then move on to Venice and Chaminade-Madonna over the next two weeks. Their lone road game in the pool is against Venice, before they return home to face Chaminade.
That opening matchup matters for Aquinas. A win over Lakeland would keep the Raiders from needing back-to-back victories against Venice and Chaminade just to get to two wins.
The Raiders bring plenty of pedigree into the playoff run. St. Thomas Aquinas owns 17 state championships in Florida and has captured seven straight state titles since 2019, with a chance to make it eight in a row this year.
Lakeland enters Pool A as the No. 5 seed and starts with a shot at revenge. After the opener against Aquinas, the Dreadnaughts travel to face Chaminade-Madonna and then finish with Venice at home.
Even if Lakeland drops the opener, the path is still there. If the Dreadnaughts can beat Chaminade and Venice, they could finish as the outright runner-up and avoid a tiebreaker.
Lakeland has won nine FHSAA football state championships, with its most recent coming in 2023.
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The reasons are easy to spot. Florida has looked sharper from the perimeter and more efficient inside, a combination that has helped create quality scoring chances and given the offense a more balanced feel. It is still early, but the Gators are no longer just a team getting noticed, they are a team being measured against the best. [Read more 🡒]