In the state of Texas high school football is a religion. On Fridays you will see long caravans driving to road games. Odessa Permian has season tickets. The stadium seats 19k. The only way to get them is if someone dies and leaves them to you in a will. We had 3 local, 1 Plainview, 1 Caynon, and 4 in Amarillo teams. Plainview is about 45 minutes, Canyon is around 1 3-4 hour drive, and Amarillo is 2 hour drive. We usually left in time to eat a pregame meal, suit up, 1 1/2 hour warm up. So, we left sometimes at noon to play an 8:00pm game out of town. If you are in the playoffs the higher seed team usually host early playoff games. The deeper you go they will have both teams meet half way. Dallas school playing a Lubbock school would meet in Abilene. It is around 2 1/5 hours between. We played El Paso in the baseball playoffs one year. We drove there. We played a best 2 out of 3. We played one game on Friday and a double dip(2 games one the same day) on Saturday. We went there on a yellow dog(look up yellow dog school bus). It say 5 1/2 hours it was more like 8. Sorry little long, but my Alma Mater played Southlake in the playoff several years ago. It is the area Jerry Jones lives. They chartered a flight to come out and play. So yes HS football in Texas will fly to games. It is rare but has happened.
@@officeblokedaz To be honest Daz id say Texas HS Football is more intense. I mean these are 15-18 year olds who have the pressure of whole towns to win a state title. When i played in high school youd have kids come up to you and ask for autographs or full grown adults talk crap about your performances, its insane and if u win youll be remembered by generations
Number 6 and 5 are neighboring cities and bitter rivals. Canton and Massillon are for the most part closed on the day they play each other. The games of those two stadiums are very well attended.
That rivalry is so good, so is Warren Harding and Massillon, I grew up going to those games back in the early 2000’s saw a lot of division 1/ NFL bound players
Around 1990 over 40,000 people attended the Indiana high school boys basketball state championship game. The game was even broadcast on tape delay over ESPN.
4:50, the dad joke is a reference to "remembering the Alamo" that Americans are taught in school. I know it may have come out of left field for someone unfamiliar.
I grew up in a fairly small town in California and high school football was the social life for everyone. Every one in town would go to all the home games every Friday night -- all the kids, parents and all the adults in town who didn't even have kids in the school anymore would go. Adults who never had kids in the school would attend. It was one big social get together for every age every Friday night -- a way of life. I never cared about football but would go to every game with all my friends -- there were cheer leaders, song leaders, and the marching band at half time. Occasionally there would be a dance in the high school gym after the game for all the high school kids who wanted to go. The high school basketball games were no different. The high school sports were a way a life.
Ah yes, Alamo Stadium...which hosted Brackenridge vs Lee for the city championship in 1963 where over 20000 fans crammed the stadium, and it was broadcast on radio and TV. It was voted the "HS Football Game of the Century" by Texas sportswriters. BTW, Lee won 55-48. Even 60 years ago Texans took football VERY seriously.
Yes a lot of Families and wealthy alumni and un wealthy alumni give to most schools ,. High school and college both, I Have been a University of Washington Husky fan in Seattle my whole life, never went to schools there couldn’t get in, but I’ve been attending games there since 1970, I’ve donated a lot, many non grads donate as well as Alumni . Great show. Thanks.
Massillon #5 I went to high school there and it's an honor to be part of that school's tradition! #6 McKinley we have a rivalry every year and it's the oldest rivalry in highschool football
My high school stadium held about 5000-5500 when I played in the early 80's. it now holds about 3500-4000. And that's for a town of 27,000 people. One unique HS stadium is in Weehawken, NJ. The stadium is on top of the entrance to the Lincoln Tunnel connecting Weehawken to Midtown Manhattan. At one end zone there is a 20-25 foot fence with scoreboard. That's to prevent kickers from trying to kick the ball (on extra points & field goals) hoping to land down the roadway at the entrance to the tunnel. I have heard that a few has succeeded in doing that.
I grew up in between Canton McKinley (#6) and Massillon (#5) and the rivalry between the two is unreal. The small cities are right next to each other, so those stadiums are pretty full with community members from both towns. The population of Canton is about 70,000 and Massillon is about half that size. There were rival fans within my own family. I had cousins that played for Massillon Tigers in the late 1970s and according to their mother, yes, tiny footballs were put in the hands of the baby boys when they were born. My mother and paternal grandfather had both attended McKinley High School, so they were big Bulldogs fans. Kind of Shakespearean--Montagues and Capulets, but not so tragic.
High school football is more about the small towns that have the hometown kids playing.. and the big rivalry is between the 3 surrounding towns. Talking 15 to 25 thousand residents in the small towns. But each town had a football team and all the parents and family and friends attended the games. But the radio would be announcing the games live! We knew the kids, or at least knew the family because in small towns every knows everyone. I remember in our small town in WI, the team was on a big losing steak, the kids were small, and the neighbor town had giants ( kids lol) that rolled over them. One year, they got 1 touchdown all year!!! Everyone cheered, and it was the talk of the town and young quarterback who'd thrown the ball was a hero.
High school teams usually play teams within their state and if the state is big enough, they don't don't venture too far from their area of the state until the playoffs. The teams are usually separated by the city the school they are in and the size of the school (student enrollment)
As far as Massillon, OH, that place is full all the time. The entire town pretty much goes to each game, and it feels like if you go to the high school, you are either on the football team or on the marching band.
My high school was Odessa Permian, the school that Friday Night Lights was about. We won the state champion championship my Sr. Year, 1972. My grandson’s have played high school playoff games at Alamo Stadium. It is nice. My town built its stadium in 1982. It held over 19,000, and most of the time the home team was packed. The high school kids sat on the home side, so it was very common for there to be 10,000 plus from our town. It was standing room only many times, especially when the crosstown rivalry games came up every year or the game with our biggest rivals, Midland Lee. My brother played a high school playoff game in El Paso.
I grew up in a Midwest town of ~2,000 people. We didn’t have a giant stadium but we still had hundreds of people at every Friday night game. The town shows up. I started doing little league cheer in 4th grade for little league football. It starts young. So much fun.
A lot of them nationwide big school small school are packed for about every game. Just truly the scope of how popular football is and also why college is as big as it is too because it all starts so young and gets so big fast. Most HS's also have a band just like college, and they play the schools fight song and perform at halftime all the same, even small high schools.
My old man told me a while back how the local main high school football field would be packed full with 10,000+ when he was growing up in the 50's and 60's. They don't draw that much nowadays but a local TV station still televises a select game on tape delay each week during the season and regional championship games air live on our network affiliates, it's that big still.
My highschool was small for the area but still holds a couple thousand and its maxxed out every game. Ppl just want to watch. What else is better on a fall Friday night. Theres like 3 million people in the metropolitan area. Thats broken into sections based on how many students go to the school. About 8 or 9 teams per section and they will all be a 15-90 min drive away. So youll play about 9 games, half home and half away. Some teams stadiums can hold a couple hundred and some can hold 5,000. All 9 games will usually be full stands. Student sections with chants and costumes. Friday football in Pittsburgh is taken very seriously but theres dozens of NFL players who played in my section. Texas is the best, California usually great, Pennsylvania underrated....
My high school had no home field. It was a private school that didn't have the enrolment and funding most other private schools do. Our practice field was a leveled garbage dump where trash would slowly creep up as we used the field over the years. We had to "borrow" other teams fields in our conference when they played away games. We were tough though, nothing like taking a tackle during during practice and falling on the corner of a 40 year old microwave that creeping up through the landfill haha
Most schools will play neighboring schools although you do some nationally ranked teams that will travel and even be show cased on ESPN for high school football. Just last year a private school out of Philly St. Josephs prep travels down to Fort Lauderdale and play national power St. Thomas Aquinas on ESPN or Espn2. I know at my high school in Pennsylvania the furthest we travel was roughly two and half hours away via coach bus for a game. Conversely just last year my alma matter play a school out of Somerville New Jersey and in the 2023 season will travel to Somerville from just outside Lancaster Pennsylvania. But generally they will play local school from neighboring counties and local leagues.
High schools can travel a couple of hundred miles but that would be rare for most. Depending on how well the team does, the stadium might have a quarter capacity. A team doing well will come close to filling the stadium every game.
Texas HS football is ridiculous, every major district in big cities like Houston and Dallas has a 5,000+ capacity stadium. There are so many that the entire list he made could’ve been stadiums from Texas. Allen HS, the last one in that video, had a 10 year home game win streak in that stadium when they lost to my high school’s rival Atascocita. Even the district we play in has a new stadium that seats 11,500 with a giant screen on one side. If you want to look it up it is called Turner Stadium in Humble, TX.
Teams from different states will play each other, it’s usually the bigger programs that do that. The first 5 games are against out of league opponents and the last 5 are against league opponents and then the playoffs.
Your answer to who they play is yes. They generally play other local (within state or city) high schools. Although the bigger better football programs will travel to other states to play a game. These games are usually the early season games.
Yep, like Nannette mentioned… Friday evenings in autumn were for high school football where I grew up in NE Pennsylvania. Our football field seated just over 8 thousand… packed for every game. We played special league games - like playoffs or all-star games in Scranton stadium which held 22 thousand. Scranton had 3 teams that used it at times as well. And the city’s semi-pro team played there, too. And the little towns in our area were filled with hungry post-game fans looking for pizza or burgers. A real community feeling was promoted by HS football!
Across all levels & types of sports in the US, if there's good scenery, stadium planners take note & don't obscure it. (From Washington High School's stadium, you can see the Golden Gate Bridge & Alcatraz, although to be fair, I got the same view a few miles away rehabbing my broken elbow at St. Francis Hospital's 11th floor.)
High School sports normally compete on a district or conference focused schedule. So majority of the the teams are within an hour or so of driving. When the playoffs for the State Championship starts that normally when traveling starts and fans truly travel bc the community rallies around the young teams bc it brings joy and pride to the community itself. Also the youth affect of having seen somebody from your school or future highschool, being put on a pedestal will make you strive for that at a young age
I live a half a mile from the Massillon Ohio stadium and I'm about 10 miles away from the Canton McKinley Hall of stadium. This was a great reaction guys I appreciate it good job.
Surprised to see the Katy ISD or CFISD (Houston area) one's weren't on the list but they will pop up in Best Texas HS stadiums list or most expensive HS stadiums lists. The Katy ISD stadium cost $70M which might be the most expensive one but I feel they got ripped off because the Cy-Fair ISD one was about $80M and it included a Football and a Basketball Arena and it's just as nice. When it comes to who these high schools play on a weekly basis, here's my Texas view which might be similar or completely different in other states..... In Texas, The actual schools are classified a designation such a 6A, 5A, 4A down to 1A and that's set by your school population. The bigger schools are 6A and so on.... They are basically Conferences. And from there, they are divided into "Divisions" and in Texas they are 32 Divisions in 6A all fighting for their own division title (usually schools in close proximity to each other, usually 8-10 teams per division) and from then on, they will go on and compete in the playoffs vs other division title winners in their own conference and in the end you fight for the state championship for your Conference. So at the end of the year, Texas will declare at least 6 different teams to be named State Champions, one for each conference. Schools also set up out of division matches against other schools and I seen teams from Texas go up against other Florida or California teams and what not. The best high school players in the nation are actually designated in a 1 to 5 Star system so the best prospects are 5 Stars. Usually when an Alabama, Texas, LSU, Michigan, Ohio State send you scholarship offers to you, you are a 5 Star and when you are getting offers from nothing but lower division colleges or community colleges, you'll most likely be a 1-2 Star player
I lived in San Antonio, Texas for 3.5 years. High school football is no joke in Texas. It draws in huge crowds. Here in California you usually only get high school kids and parents attending. High school football in the US is played by division, but once the regular season is over you keep moving up until you play state.
How far we traveled depended on the sport. Wrestling/Basketball in highschool my team from Illinois would play in tournaments in Jefferson City Missouri which is 135 miles away. Football we played teams that were within a 20 mile radius. It was fun traveling with the team, some great shenanigans always occurred Most schools around here though have excellent facilities/practice fields/weight rooms and athletic trainers that take great care of the athletes.
The more you win, the more you get from the state. Also, ticket sales as well as concessions help with the costs. I grew up in a town with a large stadium as we won state championships many, many times.
I live in western Pennsylvania. I played football, track, and played basketball at pretty averaged sized high school. Football games would definitely have thousands of spectators. Basketball games there would be hundreds, maybe a little over a thousand. Track meets would vary.
During a high school regular season for any sport, a team will typically play other teams within their district, teams from surrounding districts within the immediate area around town, and some private school teams nearby. Certain sports like hockey, baseball, basketball, etc. may even travel during a certain week to play a tournament in a different part of the state. A season typically ends after the state tournament when teams will begin to play opponents from other parts of the state the further they advance.
Whe n I was in High school in Massachusetts you were lucky to get a parking spot within a mile of the friday night game! The whole area was football crazy! Not so much theese days..Sad to say.
Just started watching your videos and you guys are doing a really great job! Definitely should have more subs! I went to high school in Frisco Texas, and loved playing in the Star! (#9/Dallas Cowboys practice facility) Even though I played “soccer” we would still have around 100 people spectating including parents and students. Obviously, wayyyy more people go to the football games because north Texas football is the best in the nation!!!
I live in San Diego and we have so many high schools just in our county that our teams play each other within San Diego. The season would not be long enough for them to get to schools outside of our area.
I’m from El Paso and what they didn’t show in this video is that El Paso HS is at the base of a mountain and there is a star at the top of that mountain. On Friday nights when HS football play the star is lit.
Depends on how high of a division you are. Big time D1 high schools like mater dei or St. John bosco or even IMG travel across the country for some games. Really just matters how much money that school makes. And most of them make plenty to support flights like that because they’re private schools.
Public high schools typically play other local schools. But private and other really good public schools travel out of state and sometimes across the country to play other good schools and nationally ranked schools get shown on ESPN from time to time. Texas High School Football is a way of life in some towns.
The Cobb County Schools in metro Atlanta have been receiving corporate money for decades. One of our high school theaters close to home has huge signs on it plugging a large metro plumbing company. That same school has just opened a certificate level “trade” program for students with many sponsors donating equipment for construction, automotive, metal fabrication/welding, nursing and computer science, all with proper recognition in signage and plaques around the school property. So it’s not just sports that garner corporate attention.
In Canada, we obviously play Canadian Football instead of American Football but those US high school stadia blow ours away. Our high schools typically just have a field with bleachers. There are a few high schools that draw 2000-3000 to games but they are the exception.
In Texas, schools are divided by population size into divisions, 1-A through 6-A. Then schools are arranged into DISTRICTS with eight or so nearby schools of the same division. Most of the travel, therefore, is usually within an hour’s drive. However, after the regular season has ended, the champions and runners-up from each district enter the playoffs (a single-elimination tournament) where they first play against a team from a nearby district and then go to the regional level, etc. until the final games are played for the state championship (for each division) usually at an NFL stadium.
Within a hours drive? Never heard of the LSWC, or in general West Texas. Eventually UIL will make an El Paso, Midland and Odessa schools be district 2 or 1
9:35 Isn't that the school from 10 Things I Hate About You? That's the stadium Heath Ledger's character does his famous singing scene to his girlfriend.
Many fields are built in a hole in the ground so an indoor stadium with a ceiling that seems too low is really high in relation to the field. This applies to stadiums at all levels like SoFy.
When I was in HS we had a game between us and dutch fork (the 2 best teams) went to the game there were no seats available, and standing room was packed. Over sold the capacity by 3000. We did win.
Most of the high schools across the country play teams in their district. The top-ranked teams in the country travel out of state to compete against the best team from other states, and most of them are televised.
When I played, and coached, high school football (Dallas/NE Texas), we would travel typically up to 3 hours. Sometimes further, sometimes we'd travel much shorter. Typically most high school stadiums are pretty full for games.
The vast majority of high school varsity football teams play just within their state or region of their state (varsity meaning the best players in the school, mostly junior/senior or third/fourth year students). However, some of the top high school programs in the country do play a mix of their local schools and high-level competition from other states or regions of their state. For example, the top nationally ranked HS team at the end of the 2022 season, St. John Bosco of Bellflower, California, mostly played other Catholic schools in the Los Angeles area... but they also played teams from Texas, Hawaii, Northern California and Oregon.
Okay, so let me introduce you to something that is so American college sports entertainment. The drum line. This is NSU (Norfolk State University) marching band as they leave the field after a game and return to the band room. This is a common practice for HBCU (Historically Black Colleges and Universities). The marching band is often of equal entertainment value as the game itself. I think you'll see why. czcams.com/video/kenPCFUoTRY/video.html
If you've not seen either the movie or follow-on TV show "Friday Night Lights" about high school football in Texas (which is said to be where it's craziest), you should. Good movie and great TV.
While I was in the Navy I remember talking to a classmate who played high school football in Texas. I was surprised when he told me that his football team had flown to distant games on an oil company jet. In my home state of Delaware, a state that is only 96 miles long and 33 miles at its widest, all football games were against other Delaware teams, and travelled to on a bus.
My newphews went to Katy High School. A few years ago , that high school built a new stadium next to their old stadium, and their old stadium could have easily made this list. They also have a basketball arena on campus that is better than many colleges and lower level pro leagues.
My school's stadium was packed every Friday night, I think it could hold around 5,000 people with 4,000 on the home side, even the visitor's area was full during our games
The importance of HS football in American towns varies from town to town. At my first HS, the nearby homeowners complained about the loud Friday night football games, so our home games all switched to saturdays at 10am. The team wasn’t great anyways so then nobody showed up to home games and now it’s less important than the school basketball team. At my second HS Friday night football games were a must see. The team was good and the whole town attended: alumni, parents, grandparents, friends, friends of friends; everyone. I went to my first game there when I was only like 10. My mom had gone to school there and so we went with her, my grandparents and siblings. Both of these high schools were on the California coast and treated football totally differently. Yet from what I’ve heard the love for high school football is more fanatical across Texas.
And thank God. We had a young man have a stroke - untouched after receiving touchdown. Came to sideline and collapsed. He was transported. He died a few days later.
Stadium High School is nearly 120 years old, and definitely one of the most picturesque schools in the nation. The 1999 teen comedy movie 10 Things I Hate About You had several scenes filmed there, including on the field itself.
I actually played an a highschool soccer state tournament in front of about 4500-5000, which is a large crowd for soccer but it was between two of the best teams in the country. You really should watch the movie Friday Night Lights. I also played high school football and where I grew up one of the Northern California state football title games (American football for clarity) was played at the Oakland Coleseaum which could hold 63k but could draw 30k+ for the state tourney games. Which is still pretty crazy for a high school game. Even a big one. And hell in Texas they play high school title games at the Dallas Cowboys stadium or the Astrodome back in the day. And they could fill it i think.
Speaking of Friday night lights, Odessa Permian and Midland Lee met in the playoffs, the 4th round. The towns of Odessa and Midland were 20 miles apart. They decided that the neutral field would be Jones Stadium of Texas Tech in Lubbock. They packed that place.
In the state of Texas high school football is a religion. On Fridays you will see long caravans driving to road games.
Odessa Permian has season tickets. The stadium seats 19k. The only way to get them is if someone dies and leaves them to you in a will.
We had 3 local, 1 Plainview, 1 Caynon, and 4 in Amarillo teams. Plainview is about 45 minutes, Canyon is around 1 3-4 hour drive, and Amarillo is 2 hour drive. We usually left in time to eat a pregame meal, suit up, 1 1/2 hour warm up. So, we left sometimes at noon to play an 8:00pm game out of town.
If you are in the playoffs the higher seed team usually host early playoff games. The deeper you go they will have both teams meet half way. Dallas school playing a Lubbock school would meet in Abilene. It is around 2 1/5 hours between.
We played El Paso in the baseball playoffs one year. We drove there. We played a best 2 out of 3. We played one game on Friday and a double dip(2 games one the same day) on Saturday. We went there on a yellow dog(look up yellow dog school bus). It say 5 1/2 hours it was more like 8.
Sorry little long, but my Alma Mater played Southlake in the playoff several years ago. It is the area Jerry Jones lives. They chartered a flight to come out and play. So yes HS football in Texas will fly to games. It is rare but has happened.
U dont know passion till u see texas and their high school football lol
What about Manchester City v Manchester United?
@@officeblokedaz To be honest Daz id say Texas HS Football is more intense. I mean these are 15-18 year olds who have the pressure of whole towns to win a state title. When i played in high school youd have kids come up to you and ask for autographs or full grown adults talk crap about your performances, its insane and if u win youll be remembered by generations
@@officeblokedaz first you have their teams division and you have to win that to play against other teams in your state for the state title
Damn cali still better
@@cam9752 in terms of talent probably, but the texas football culture clears
Number 6 and 5 are neighboring cities and bitter rivals. Canton and Massillon are for the most part closed on the day they play each other. The games of those two stadiums are very well attended.
That rivalry is so good, so is Warren Harding and Massillon, I grew up going to those games back in the early 2000’s saw a lot of division 1/ NFL bound players
Around 1990 over 40,000 people attended the Indiana high school boys basketball state championship game. The game was even broadcast on tape delay over ESPN.
4:50, the dad joke is a reference to "remembering the Alamo" that Americans are taught in school. I know it may have come out of left field for someone unfamiliar.
I grew up in a fairly small town in California and high school football was the social life for everyone. Every one in town would go to all the home games every Friday night -- all the kids, parents and all the adults in town who didn't even have kids in the school anymore would go. Adults who never had kids in the school would attend. It was one big social get together for every age every Friday night -- a way of life. I never cared about football but would go to every game with all my friends -- there were cheer leaders, song leaders, and the marching band at half time. Occasionally there would be a dance in the high school gym after the game for all the high school kids who wanted to go. The high school basketball games were no different. The high school sports were a way a life.
So sad....
@@sobrevalorado how
We used to travel up to an hour away for games
I would say these were the coolest high school stadiums but idk about the best. Texas itself has pro-caliber stadiums that weren’t shown
Ah yes, Alamo Stadium...which hosted Brackenridge vs Lee for the city championship in 1963 where over 20000 fans crammed the stadium, and it was broadcast on radio and TV. It was voted the "HS Football Game of the Century" by Texas sportswriters. BTW, Lee won 55-48. Even 60 years ago Texans took football VERY seriously.
If every game isn't broadcasted, is it really a team worth following?
Yes a lot of Families and wealthy alumni and un wealthy alumni give to most schools ,. High school and college both, I Have been a University of Washington Husky fan in Seattle my whole life, never went to schools there couldn’t get in, but I’ve been attending games there since 1970, I’ve donated a lot, many non grads donate as well as Alumni . Great show. Thanks.
Massillon #5 I went to high school there and it's an honor to be part of that school's tradition! #6 McKinley we have a rivalry every year and it's the oldest rivalry in highschool football
They’re usually sold out, and the large division high schools, in most states, it’s going to be 1,000 to 5,000 every Friday night.
My high school stadium held about 5000-5500 when I played in the early 80's. it now holds about 3500-4000. And that's for a town of 27,000 people. One unique HS stadium is in Weehawken, NJ. The stadium is on top of the entrance to the Lincoln Tunnel connecting Weehawken to Midtown Manhattan. At one end zone there is a 20-25 foot fence with scoreboard. That's to prevent kickers from trying to kick the ball (on extra points & field goals) hoping to land down the roadway at the entrance to the tunnel. I have heard that a few has succeeded in doing that.
Stadium in Tacoma is awesome and the school itself is even more awesome. Architecturally and scenic setting is unrivaled
I grew up in between Canton McKinley (#6) and Massillon (#5) and the rivalry between the two is unreal. The small cities are right next to each other, so those stadiums are pretty full with community members from both towns. The population of Canton is about 70,000 and Massillon is about half that size. There were rival fans within my own family. I had cousins that played for Massillon Tigers in the late 1970s and according to their mother, yes, tiny footballs were put in the hands of the baby boys when they were born. My mother and paternal grandfather had both attended McKinley High School, so they were big Bulldogs fans. Kind of Shakespearean--Montagues and Capulets, but not so tragic.
PTO!!
High school football is more about the small towns that have the hometown kids playing.. and the big rivalry is between the 3 surrounding towns. Talking 15 to 25 thousand residents in the small towns. But each town had a football team and all the parents and family and friends attended the games. But the radio would be announcing the games live! We knew the kids, or at least knew the family because in small towns every knows everyone. I remember in our small town in WI, the team was on a big losing steak, the kids were small, and the neighbor town had giants ( kids lol) that rolled over them. One year, they got 1 touchdown all year!!! Everyone cheered, and it was the talk of the town and young quarterback who'd thrown the ball was a hero.
High school teams usually play teams within their state and if the state is big enough, they don't don't venture too far from their area of the state until the playoffs. The teams are usually separated by the city the school they are in and the size of the school (student enrollment)
As far as Massillon, OH, that place is full all the time. The entire town pretty much goes to each game, and it feels like if you go to the high school, you are either on the football team or on the marching band.
My high school was Odessa Permian, the school that Friday Night Lights was about. We won the state champion championship my Sr. Year, 1972. My grandson’s have played high school playoff games at Alamo Stadium. It is nice. My town built its stadium in 1982. It held over 19,000, and most of the time the home team was packed. The high school kids sat on the home side, so it was very common for there to be 10,000 plus from our town. It was standing room only many times, especially when the crosstown rivalry games came up every year or the game with our biggest rivals, Midland Lee. My brother played a high school playoff game in El Paso.
I grew up in a Midwest town of ~2,000 people. We didn’t have a giant stadium but we still had hundreds of people at every Friday night game. The town shows up.
I started doing little league cheer in 4th grade for little league football. It starts young. So much fun.
A lot of them nationwide big school small school are packed for about every game. Just truly the scope of how popular football is and also why college is as big as it is too because it all starts so young and gets so big fast. Most HS's also have a band just like college, and they play the schools fight song and perform at halftime all the same, even small high schools.
My old man told me a while back how the local main high school football field would be packed full with 10,000+ when he was growing up in the 50's and 60's. They don't draw that much nowadays but a local TV station still televises a select game on tape delay each week during the season and regional championship games air live on our network affiliates, it's that big still.
My highschool was small for the area but still holds a couple thousand and its maxxed out every game. Ppl just want to watch. What else is better on a fall Friday night.
Theres like 3 million people in the metropolitan area. Thats broken into sections based on how many students go to the school. About 8 or 9 teams per section and they will all be a 15-90 min drive away. So youll play about 9 games, half home and half away. Some teams stadiums can hold a couple hundred and some can hold 5,000. All 9 games will usually be full stands. Student sections with chants and costumes. Friday football in Pittsburgh is taken very seriously but theres dozens of NFL players who played in my section. Texas is the best, California usually great, Pennsylvania underrated....
My high school had no home field. It was a private school that didn't have the enrolment and funding most other private schools do. Our practice field was a leveled garbage dump where trash would slowly creep up as we used the field over the years. We had to "borrow" other teams fields in our conference when they played away games. We were tough though, nothing like taking a tackle during during practice and falling on the corner of a 40 year old microwave that creeping up through the landfill haha
High schools travel among districts that are in your class by size but can go 30-40 miles to support your team average crowd 2-4000
Most schools will play neighboring schools although you do some nationally ranked teams that will travel and even be show cased on ESPN for high school football. Just last year a private school out of Philly St. Josephs prep travels down to Fort Lauderdale and play national power St. Thomas Aquinas on ESPN or Espn2. I know at my high school in Pennsylvania the furthest we travel was roughly two and half hours away via coach bus for a game. Conversely just last year my alma matter play a school out of Somerville New Jersey and in the 2023 season will travel to Somerville from just outside Lancaster Pennsylvania. But generally they will play local school from neighboring counties and local leagues.
High schools can travel a couple of hundred miles but that would be rare for most. Depending on how well the team does, the stadium might have a quarter capacity. A team doing well will come close to filling the stadium every game.
I love that cheeky snide remark at the end by the son LOL
Texas HS football is ridiculous, every major district in big cities like Houston and Dallas has a 5,000+ capacity stadium. There are so many that the entire list he made could’ve been stadiums from Texas. Allen HS, the last one in that video, had a 10 year home game win streak in that stadium when they lost to my high school’s rival Atascocita. Even the district we play in has a new stadium that seats 11,500 with a giant screen on one side. If you want to look it up it is called Turner Stadium in Humble, TX.
I love everytime the Dallas Cowboys are mentioned Daz ALWAYS brings up Jerry Jones. Jerry Jones would love you for that lmfaoo.
My high school was in central Ohio and we usually played at least one game in Canada every year.
Teams from different states will play each other, it’s usually the bigger programs that do that. The first 5 games are against out of league opponents and the last 5 are against league opponents and then the playoffs.
Your answer to who they play is yes. They generally play other local (within state or city) high schools. Although the bigger better football programs will travel to other states to play a game. These games are usually the early season games.
Yep, like Nannette mentioned… Friday evenings in autumn were for high school football where I grew up in NE Pennsylvania.
Our football field seated just over 8 thousand… packed for every game.
We played special league games - like playoffs or all-star games in Scranton stadium which held 22 thousand. Scranton had 3 teams that used it at times as well.
And the city’s semi-pro team played there, too.
And the little towns in our area were filled with hungry post-game fans looking for pizza or burgers.
A real community feeling was promoted by HS football!
Across all levels & types of sports in the US, if there's good scenery, stadium planners take note & don't obscure it. (From Washington High School's stadium, you can see the Golden Gate Bridge & Alcatraz, although to be fair, I got the same view a few miles away rehabbing my broken elbow at St. Francis Hospital's 11th floor.)
High School sports normally compete on a district or conference focused schedule. So majority of the the teams are within an hour or so of driving. When the playoffs for the State Championship starts that normally when traveling starts and fans truly travel bc the community rallies around the young teams bc it brings joy and pride to the community itself. Also the youth affect of having seen somebody from your school or future highschool, being put on a pedestal will make you strive for that at a young age
I live a half a mile from the Massillon Ohio stadium and I'm about 10 miles away from the Canton McKinley Hall of stadium. This was a great reaction guys I appreciate it good job.
In Texas we travel to out of town games to watch our high school team play. Friday night High school football is King.
Highkey enjoy watching y’all’s videos. Keep it up
Surprised to see the Katy ISD or CFISD (Houston area) one's weren't on the list but they will pop up in Best Texas HS stadiums list or most expensive HS stadiums lists. The Katy ISD stadium cost $70M which might be the most expensive one but I feel they got ripped off because the Cy-Fair ISD one was about $80M and it included a Football and a Basketball Arena and it's just as nice.
When it comes to who these high schools play on a weekly basis, here's my Texas view which might be similar or completely different in other states.....
In Texas, The actual schools are classified a designation such a 6A, 5A, 4A down to 1A and that's set by your school population. The bigger schools are 6A and so on.... They are basically Conferences.
And from there, they are divided into "Divisions" and in Texas they are 32 Divisions in 6A all fighting for their own division title (usually schools in close proximity to each other, usually 8-10 teams per division) and from then on, they will go on and compete in the playoffs vs other division title winners in their own conference and in the end you fight for the state championship for your Conference.
So at the end of the year, Texas will declare at least 6 different teams to be named State Champions, one for each conference.
Schools also set up out of division matches against other schools and I seen teams from Texas go up against other Florida or California teams and what not.
The best high school players in the nation are actually designated in a 1 to 5 Star system so the best prospects are 5 Stars. Usually when an Alabama, Texas, LSU, Michigan, Ohio State send you scholarship offers to you, you are a 5 Star and when you are getting offers from nothing but lower division colleges or community colleges, you'll most likely be a 1-2 Star player
I went to the ORIGINAL Cy-Fair High School. In the late 70s, we had the newest, largest football stadium in Texas.
Buford,Ga High School has a 75 million dollar stadium under construction. Will hold about 12,000 with a massive press box and I think luxury boxes.
I lived in San Antonio, Texas for 3.5 years. High school football is no joke in Texas. It draws in huge crowds. Here in California you usually only get high school kids and parents attending. High school football in the US is played by division, but once the regular season is over you keep moving up until you play state.
How far we traveled depended on the sport. Wrestling/Basketball in highschool my team from Illinois would play in tournaments in Jefferson City Missouri which is 135 miles away. Football we played teams that were within a 20 mile radius.
It was fun traveling with the team, some great shenanigans always occurred
Most schools around here though have excellent facilities/practice fields/weight rooms and athletic trainers that take great care of the athletes.
The more you win, the more you get from the state. Also, ticket sales as well as concessions help with the costs. I grew up in a town with a large stadium as we won state championships many, many times.
I live in western Pennsylvania. I played football, track, and played basketball at pretty averaged sized high school. Football games would definitely have thousands of spectators. Basketball games there would be hundreds, maybe a little over a thousand. Track meets would vary.
West mifflin area high school you can look it up. We have a Jumbotron lol
Great reaction guys!
During a high school regular season for any sport, a team will typically play other teams within their district, teams from surrounding districts within the immediate area around town, and some private school teams nearby. Certain sports like hockey, baseball, basketball, etc. may even travel during a certain week to play a tournament in a different part of the state. A season typically ends after the state tournament when teams will begin to play opponents from other parts of the state the further they advance.
Whe n I was in High school in Massachusetts you were lucky to get a parking spot within a mile of the friday night game! The whole area was football crazy! Not so much theese days..Sad to say.
Just started watching your videos and you guys are doing a really great job! Definitely should have more subs! I went to high school in Frisco Texas, and loved playing in the Star! (#9/Dallas Cowboys practice facility) Even though I played “soccer” we would still have around 100 people spectating including parents and students. Obviously, wayyyy more people go to the football games because north Texas football is the best in the nation!!!
I once attended a game at Massilon Paul Brown Tiger Stadium. The visiting team came all the way from Washington D.C.
Glad you did this ,yes there are lots more great high school stadiums in the states as always it was great
I live in San Diego and we have so many high schools just in our county that our teams play each other within San Diego. The season would not be long enough for them to get to schools outside of our area.
I’m from El Paso and what they didn’t show in this video is that El Paso HS is at the base of a mountain and there is a star at the top of that mountain. On Friday nights when HS football play the star is lit.
Depends on how high of a division you are. Big time D1 high schools like mater dei or St. John bosco or even IMG travel across the country for some games. Really just matters how much money that school makes. And most of them make plenty to support flights like that because they’re private schools.
Allen Eagle Alumni here! Because of the cracks I couldn’t graduate in 2014 in the stadium! Had to graduate at American Airlines Center!
The High School football hall of Fame is in Valdosta Georgia. If you're in southern Georgia anytime
In Kansas you can travel half the state for a football game. And our high school games are always pretty full.
8:45, Daz's mouth literally dropped at the sight of the El Paso High school and stadium. Have to amit so did mine.
Public high schools typically play other local schools. But private and other really good public schools travel out of state and sometimes across the country to play other good schools and nationally ranked schools get shown on ESPN from time to time. Texas High School Football is a way of life in some towns.
El paso, Texas one is iconic!
The Cobb County Schools in metro Atlanta have been receiving corporate money for decades. One of our high school theaters close to home has huge signs on it plugging a large metro plumbing company. That same school has just opened a certificate level “trade” program for students with many sponsors donating equipment for construction, automotive, metal fabrication/welding, nursing and computer science, all with proper recognition in signage and plaques around the school property. So it’s not just sports that garner corporate attention.
I live in massillon, and they regularly sell out. THe annual massillon vs mckinley game is one of the longest running rivalries in the country
In Canada, we obviously play Canadian Football instead of American Football but those US high school stadia blow ours away. Our high schools typically just have a field with bleachers. There are a few high schools that draw 2000-3000 to games but they are the exception.
Fun fact: Jim Thorpe played for the Massillon Tigers, NFL team.
In Texas, schools are divided by population size into divisions, 1-A through 6-A. Then schools are arranged into DISTRICTS with eight or so nearby schools of the same division. Most of the travel, therefore, is usually within an hour’s drive. However, after the regular season has ended, the champions and runners-up from each district enter the playoffs (a single-elimination tournament) where they first play against a team from a nearby district and then go to the regional level, etc. until the final games are played for the state championship (for each division) usually at an NFL stadium.
Within a hours drive? Never heard of the LSWC, or in general West Texas. Eventually UIL will make an El Paso, Midland and Odessa schools be district 2 or 1
Canton and Massillon are about a 25 min drive from each other, typically sells out each year.
9:35 Isn't that the school from 10 Things I Hate About You? That's the stadium Heath Ledger's character does his famous singing scene to his girlfriend.
Many fields are built in a hole in the ground so an indoor stadium with a ceiling that seems too low is really high in relation to the field. This applies to stadiums at all levels like SoFy.
My HS stadium was called "The Pit" dug out on the side of hill.
probably only held 1200 or so
ocd...please move the mouse to the side of the video.
When I was in HS we had a game between us and dutch fork (the 2 best teams) went to the game there were no seats available, and standing room was packed. Over sold the capacity by 3000. We did win.
In South Carolina?
@@ritayprice3510 yeah
A.L. Brown Wonders vs Concord Spiders battle for the bell in North Carolina
Most of the high schools across the country play teams in their district. The top-ranked teams in the country travel out of state to compete against the best team from other states, and most of them are televised.
You guys should definitely check out some high school football highlights
When I played, and coached, high school football (Dallas/NE Texas), we would travel typically up to 3 hours. Sometimes further, sometimes we'd travel much shorter.
Typically most high school stadiums are pretty full for games.
That’s cap. West Texas yeah, DFW no.
@@henryjw15umm... We'd play the schools in Louisiana and west Texas....
The vast majority of high school varsity football teams play just within their state or region of their state (varsity meaning the best players in the school, mostly junior/senior or third/fourth year students). However, some of the top high school programs in the country do play a mix of their local schools and high-level competition from other states or regions of their state. For example, the top nationally ranked HS team at the end of the 2022 season, St. John Bosco of Bellflower, California, mostly played other Catholic schools in the Los Angeles area... but they also played teams from Texas, Hawaii, Northern California and Oregon.
Okay, so let me introduce you to something that is so American college sports entertainment. The drum line. This is NSU (Norfolk State University) marching band as they leave the field after a game and return to the band room. This is a common practice for HBCU (Historically Black Colleges and Universities). The marching band is often of equal entertainment value as the game itself. I think you'll see why. czcams.com/video/kenPCFUoTRY/video.html
7:43 it depends some high schools play nationally and around the country and some play just around there districts
I went to a D3 college and that last stadium is better than any in our conference. Unreal for a high school
If you've not seen either the movie or follow-on TV show "Friday Night Lights" about high school football in Texas (which is said to be where it's craziest), you should. Good movie and great TV.
While I was in the Navy I remember talking to a classmate who played high school football in Texas. I was surprised when he told me that his football team had flown to distant games on an oil company jet. In my home state of Delaware, a state that is only 96 miles long and 33 miles at its widest, all football games were against other Delaware teams, and travelled to on a bus.
My newphews went to Katy High School. A few years ago , that high school built a new stadium next to their old stadium, and their old stadium could have easily made this list. They also have a basketball arena on campus that is better than many colleges and lower level pro leagues.
Stadium 6 is right next to the NFL Hall of Fame. It hosts the 1st NFL pre-season game each year.
My high school home football stadium was Alamo Stadium.
It’s amazing that
The Massillion Ohio Stadium (16,000) is only about 20 minutes away from the Canton Ohio Stadium (23,000)
My school's stadium was packed every Friday night, I think it could hold around 5,000 people with 4,000 on the home side, even the visitor's area was full during our games
We would get 7-8 k sometimes in Illinois at our games mostly rivalry games
The importance of HS football in American towns varies from town to town. At my first HS, the nearby homeowners complained about the loud Friday night football games, so our home games all switched to saturdays at 10am. The team wasn’t great anyways so then nobody showed up to home games and now it’s less important than the school basketball team. At my second HS Friday night football games were a must see. The team was good and the whole town attended: alumni, parents, grandparents, friends, friends of friends; everyone. I went to my first game there when I was only like 10. My mom had gone to school there and so we went with her, my grandparents and siblings. Both of these high schools were on the California coast and treated football totally differently. Yet from what I’ve heard the love for high school football is more fanatical across Texas.
Did ya notice at 1:20 that even at a high school game, there is literally an ambulance in stand by? ... MERIKA!!!
And thank God. We had a young man have a stroke - untouched after receiving touchdown. Came to sideline and collapsed. He was transported. He died a few days later.
The one in Tacoma, WA (#2 I believe) was in the movie "10 things i hate about you"
At Allen HS, #1, there are season ticket holders. It is sold out every game.
Duncanville Tx. 6A state Champs.
Go Panthers!!
My high school played in a county wide league and the state championship playoffs
please do basketball - college stadiums
Inlived in Dallas, Texas. Football ran everything. I cooked at one of the games.and we sold 10k hotdogs.
high schools can travel around the country but usually only the good ones my school really only played teams up to a couple hours away
Stadium High School is nearly 120 years old, and definitely one of the most picturesque schools in the nation. The 1999 teen comedy movie 10 Things I Hate About You had several scenes filmed there, including on the field itself.
Absolutely love eagle stadium. My old home
Now it’s time to react to High school big hits
I actually played an a highschool soccer state tournament in front of about 4500-5000, which is a large crowd for soccer but it was between two of the best teams in the country. You really should watch the movie Friday Night Lights. I also played high school football and where I grew up one of the Northern California state football title games (American football for clarity) was played at the Oakland Coleseaum which could hold 63k but could draw 30k+ for the state tourney games. Which is still pretty crazy for a high school game. Even a big one. And hell in Texas they play high school title games at the Dallas Cowboys stadium or the Astrodome back in the day. And they could fill it i think.
Speaking of Friday night lights, Odessa Permian and Midland Lee met in the playoffs, the 4th round. The towns of Odessa and Midland were 20 miles apart. They decided that the neutral field would be Jones Stadium of Texas Tech in Lubbock. They packed that place.
The big national teams will travel all over the country.
Stadium High School (#2) figured significantly in the movie "10 Things I Hate About You".
Number 2 was used in the movie 10 Things I Hate About You