On Monday Feb. 2, the UIL announced the new athletic districts that will be used from the fall of 2026 to the spring of 2028. The announcement led to some changes for the school in terms of their actual district as well as the teams inside of it. Right now, we are in District 25-6A, but in six months, we will transition to District 24-6A. However, there is not much of an impact on this part of the realignment. The part that is a bigger deal is the teams we will now be facing in district play every year, which has changed quite a bit. In District 25, we have played against Cedar Ridge, Hutto, Manor, McNeil, Round Rock, Stony Point, Vista Ridge, and Westwood. Now in District 24, our district comprises of Cedar Park, East View, Hutto, Leander, Rouse, and Vista Ridge. Not only has the size of our district changed, going from nine to seven schools, but the size of the schools we compete against has gone down as well with four of these six other schools having been competing in the 5A division as of late. This part of the realignment worked out well for us in terms of consistently winning district in the sports that receive the most attention, as our district is expected to be weaker overall than the one we are in right now. For reference, we made the state semifinals in football this year and ended up being ranked the No. 65 team in the state, and only one of the other six teams in District 24 are ranked in the top 200 in MaxPreps’s end-of-season state of Texas rankings. In basketball, we are currently ranked No. 7 in the Astrohoops city power rankings, ahead of all fellow District 24 teams. This is different when compare to our current District 25, where Westwood and Round Rock are ahead of us. If we keep performing how we have been recently in basketball and football, we should be winning district titles almost every year, which would obviously be a very successful accomplishment.
Despite the new district being a positive for the Vipers, I would consider realignment also a negative for us because of the playoff implications. For the past few years, we have been in Region IV when it comes to the playoff brackets, facing San Antonio teams in the playoffs after the first round of playoffs, up until the final four. Now with the new redistricting, we are in Region III for the playoff brackets, meaning we will play majority Houston-area schools in playoffs until the final four. This could be a problem come playoff time, as Houston-area schools are typically more athletic, and in most cases straight up better than San Antonio-area schools. Quite a few of the biggest football powerhouses in the whole state are in the Houston area, which includes schools like North Shore, King (beat us in football playoffs this year), Summer Creek, and Katy. As for basketball, five of the top 15 programs in the state are from the Houston area, which is significant when compared to there only being two from the San Antonio area. If you would have told me that we wouldn’t have to play against Westlake or Lake Travis in the first round of playoffs anymore, I’d have said that’s a great thing, which I discussed in my “We Should Not Play Westlake, Lake Travis in Round One of Playoffs” article from last month. However, I would argue that this really isn’t much, if any, of a better result for us.
Even though winning more district titles sounds nice, there is a good chance that the playoffs aren’t going to be as nice for the next couple of years, making the realignment a bad outcome for the Vipers.
