FHSAA ends contract with Daytona Beach after a year
Looking for a new site to host state championships
The Florida High School Athletic Association is again searching for a venue for state football championship games after a one-year stay in Daytona Beach turned into a four-day debacle.
The FHSAA quietly severed its threeyear contract to hold the five large classification finals at Daytona Stadium through 2021 after last season’s finals were marred by major traffic delays and several facility issues.
“We decided mutually to abandon that site,” FHSAA executive director George Tomyn said in a phone interview with the Sentinel on Friday. “We had a history of going to Daytona in previous years [1989-96] and it had been a fine location for us. It did not work out well for us last year and we knew we needed to find something different.”
The FHSAA did not publicly announce the termination of its contract with DME Sports, the company that began managing Daytona Stadium in 2018. The search for a
new venue is not on the agenda for the association’s board of directors Zoom conference meetings on Monday and Tuesday. But the topic could be brought up.
The FHSAA’s Gainesville headquarters, like schools across the state, have been closed for nearly three months due to the coronavirus outbreak.
“We’re in the search mode right now,” Tomyn said. “We’re looking around the state at various places. Of course the search process is complicated with what we’re going through within our state and nation right now.”
The FHSAA moved the football finals away from Camping World Stadium last season after a 12-year stay in Orlando. It held three small-school finals in Tallahassee and the five large-class games in Daytona Beach.
The agreement to hold the Class 1A, 2A and 3A finals at Gene Cox Stadium in Tallahassee through 2021 remains in place.
Tomyn said it is too early to speculate on whether Orlando or any other city might be in the running to host next season’s Class 4A through 8A finals.
Daytona was dropped after experiencing numerous problems as host last December.
Hundreds of spectators arrived late to games, some after halftime, after finding themselves stuck in bumper-to-bumper traffic congestion. That included late arrivals in a capacity crowd of nearly 10,000 that attended the Class 5A final. Jones High of Orlando lost 34-17 to Miami Northwestern in that game with a number of fans watching from a makeshift standing-room-only section in the West end zone.
Apopka and Edgewater also lost state title games in a historic season that saw three Orange County teams reach FHSAA football finals in a season for the first time.
FHSAA administrators also cited a malfunctioning scoreboard, parking problems and a shortage of security.
“We’re not going to put our teams or our fans through that again,” Tomyn said.