“The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry.”
Mice. Trojans. Steers. Lions.
Pick a mascot, and prepare to rip out a few pages of the game plan.
That paraphrased line of prose describes what many high school athletic programs in the state will experience Monday, Feb. 2.
At 9 a.m. Monday, the University Interscholastic League announces its biennial realignment, once again changing the landscape of the high school sports it governs across the state.
It happens every two years, and despite the amount of preparation, most programs will endure an element of surprise when new districts for football, volleyball and basketball are announced.
Which schools will be placed in a district it didn’t seem coming? Which football teams will lose part or most of its preplanned non-district games? Which coaches will start updating their resumes after being placed in a “District of Doom?”
The Wichita Falls area certainly has a few “wild cards” for football realignment, which is the only sport these predictions will focus on. A wild card is a team that could be pulled in several directions and alter the entire look of a region.
Quanah, Vernon and Graham are three notable wild cards that will play a massive role in each respective region’s layout.
We have compiled the mock realignment predictions of Dave Campbell’s Texas Football’s Matt Stepp and Carl Padilla, founder of The Padilla Poll to compare alongside our own. While Stepp and Padilla provide statewide predictions, these are relegated to districts featuring teams from the TRN Sports coverage area.
Class 5A Division II
No drama for Wichita Falls ISD.
But that’s only after the UIL raised the cutoff number between 5A Division I and Division II. If that doesn’t occur, then Legacy is a Division I wild card, potentially going west into a Panhandle district or east into Dallas-Fort Worth.
Instead, Legacy will almost certainly join Memorial in the familiar District 2-5A Division II. The opponents are essentially the same with Plainview (gone to Class 4A Division I) replaced by Lubbock Coronado.
As you can see from the above consensus, it’s difficult to see another path here.
Class 4A Division II
All three projections show the volatility of Graham’s projections and how far reaching it can be. Stepp and I use Graham as a link to a district that spans from the Oklahoma border to northwest Fort Worth and potentially beyond.
Padilla shifts Graham south into a “mop-up” district, gathering several teams that don’t have a perfect fit on the 4A Division II map, including Brownwood and Glen Rose.
In that scenario, Padilla is correct in putting Burkburnett and Iowa Park with Gainesville, Bridgeport and Denton County schools. That makes the most sense if those two Wichita County programs are separated from Graham.
I think it makes too much sense to keep Graham with Iowa Park and Burkburnett. This district aligns with the 3-4A Division II league of this past year, replacing Eagle Mountain with Lake Worth and adding Iowa Park. Glen Rose is a convenient link between Brownwood and Hillsboro, pulling those three south toward a district with Waco-area teams.
Class 3A Division I
Vernon is a wild card because the Lions could be pulled into the Panhandle as a fourth or fifth team to complete a district made up of Bushland, Dalhart, Shallowater and Brownfield. It wouldn’t be the first time this happened to the Lions. They joined Iowa Park in a similar district in 2014.
There are just enough schools out west to put together districts without forcing Vernon into traveling that direction. The UIL is not afraid of creating four-team districts in this classification and will likely have at least one in Region I.
All three of use see Vernon joining Bowie in a five- or six-team district with eastward opponents. Padilla and I are on the same page with Boyd, Paradise and Peaster.
Stepp goes a different route and actually has Peaster in a five-team district with Big Country schools. I felt Stepp was trying to make each district have at least five teams, so that playoff spots aren’t guaranteed. But again, the UIL has routinely created four-team districts in West Texas, including an all-El Paso district in 5A DI last season.
With Peaster in the fold, there’s no need to nab Pilot Point and Whitesboro to round out a district, especially when those teams make so much more sense elsewhere.
Class 3A Division II
No drama here.
The expectation is for this district to remain exactly the same. It’s hard to envision another path for any of these teams. Valley View could be pulled east, leaving it as a five-team district, or Jacksboro and Millsap could be broken off to group with Tolar and others, meaning Callisburg and S&S Consolidated potentially return to the district.
But the current lineup makes the most sense.
Class 2A Division I
It is very possible that Nocona and Olney — the area’s only 2A Division I programs — are placed in the same district like Padilla suggests here. I also think if that happens, then there’s not a need to pull Tom Bean and Whitewright into the district.
I couldn’t get to a point where I felt good about Nocona and Olney in the same district. Olney is a Class 2A Division I wild card because it is on an island and could be pulled in two different directions. The Cubs still make the most sense sticking with the four other teams remaining from District 4-2A Division II, which only loses Stamford (dropping to 2A DII) in mine and Stepp’s projections.
Muenster and Chico rising from 2A Division II creates two nearby district mates for Nocona and Alvord, and it should keep that district from being pulled as far east as it was the last two realignments. It went as far as Wolfe City last time. It doesn’t need to reach further than Tioga for this go-round.
Stepp adds Trenton, Tom Bean and Whitewright to create an eight-team league. That’s travel the UIL can spare these teams from with enough teams in a central area to create a solid district.
Class 2A Division II
If I didn’t know better, I’d guess Padilla was a Wichita Falls-based journalist. His prediction for both 2A divisions set up the best possible coverage scenarios for local sports media, placing all of our teams in a district together.
I would love to see his version of District 5-2A Division II. I also don’t think it happens.
I do think Quanah returns to the local district after being in the Panhandle for the past four years. There are a lot of Lubbock-area teams in this division now. There’s enough to create three districts of at least six teams each without pulling Quanah into the fray.
That pushes the Indians east, but I think we see something similar to the 2020 realignment when a dividing line was placed between Archer City and Windthorst, sending the Trojans and Petrolia into an eastward district.
Muenster and Chico rising to 2A Division I creates a void that isn’t easily filled there. Petrolia and Windthorst make the most sense to replace those two in a district with Lindsay, Collinsville, Era and Santo.
But this was the hardest classification/division to project, indicated by all three of us coming up with a different prediction. There could feasibly be as many as four districts housing our eight local 2A Division II teams.
If that doesn’t perfectly capture the unpredictability of UIL Realignment day, nothing does.
This article originally appeared on Wichita Falls Times Record News: Predicting Wichita Falls area football 2026 UIL Realignment
Reporting by Jonathan Hull, Wichita Falls Times Record News / Wichita Falls Times Record News
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