UIL officially announced district re-alignments Thursday, Feb. 1, bringing several changes to the schedules of Dublin and Lingleville teams.
“I’m excited to see some teams we haven’t seen before,” said Dublin ISD Athletic Director Greg Hardcastle. “Eastland is in there. We played Tolar a few years back. We’ve been playing Brady so we’re familiar with them from that and we were actually going to play Clifton in Non-District [next year].”
“It’s a little bit different look for us,” said Hardcastle. “I think it’s going to be a competitive district.”
Hardcastle said Lions fans can look forward to some pre-season changes on the gridiron too as they will return to facing DeLeon in the first game of the 2024 season. Some new opponents also appeared for preseason as ADs around the state worked to secure schedules after Thursday’s announcement. Dublin will still face Millsap, this time before district play. Hardcastle also accepted some requests from Bowie and Lindsay to fill preseason slots.
“Basketball and Volleyball are mostly going to be the same except Brock went to 4A and Tolar is coming up [from2A],” said Hardcastle.
The 2024-25 districts for Dublin are as follows:
Football Brady Clifton Dublin Early Eastland Tolar
Volleyball/Basketball Breckenridge Comanche Dublin Early Eastland Millsap Peaster Tolar
Lingleville
Realignment meant a lot of notable changes for Lingleville.
“On the football side of things our travel distance got cut in half with the loss of Bryson, Perrin-Whitt and the addition of Ranger into 1A region 4 district 13,” said Lingleville Assistant AD Garrett Stewart.
Stewart believes playoff prospects are bright for Lingleville football as the reigning district runner-up moved out and the Cardinals are returning all but one players while bringing in talent from the 2023-24 8th graders.
“[On the basketball side,] Graford and Slidell both moved up to 2A; Gordon and Strawn both were moved into region 2 (what was originally district 17) with Cherokee, Richland Springs, and Brookesmith is now district 25 in region 4,” said Stewart. “Once again, I feel like this sets us up to make a deep playoff run and make a play for a district championship.”
Volleyball changed the least for Lingleville.
“There was some district shuffling across the board but not near to the extent that the other sports went through,” said Stewart. “With the return of most of our core group we are confident in our team and coaching staff to make another playoff run this year.”
The 2024-25 districts for Lingleville are as follows: Football
Baird Gordon Gorman Lingleville Ranger
Basketball
Bluff Dale Gorman Huckabay Iredell Lingleville Three Way School Walnut Springs
Volleyball Gorman Gustine Lingleville Rising Star