By G Bruce Grayson | EIVisuals.com
May 25th, 2021
@ei_visuals_com
Back in April 2021, Maxpreps.com issued their 2021 high school football season’s Top (10) New Jersey football rankings. And while being born and bred in South Jersey, I naturally checked to see how many schools from South Jersey were in that list.
(https://www.maxpreps.com/state/football/new-jersey.htm, updated on May 4th, 2021 ).
To my disappointment I only found three (3) schools from South Jersey, listed in the Top (10).
It seems to me, since I can remember, that South Jersey high schools usually play the bit part, to the schools from the North. And yes, I am biased and a little jaded but how can the top half of the state consistently produce the so many better teams.
North Jersey has the higher population density advantage, even though from a geographical point of view, the North and South are roughly about the same in land mass.
When I expanded the list to show the Top (25)
New Jersey high school football teams, (11) of the next (15) schools were from South Jersey, making the total of (13) in the Top (25) and I started feeling a lot better.
For the next (25) schools, for the Top (50), only (5) schools from South Jersey made the grade for a total of (18) in the Top (50).
So to cut to the chase, the last (50) schools, to round out the top (100) over all count and found that (20) schools from South Jersey made the cut. And if we look at the final tallies for the over all top (100) schools (*the list may slightly vary over the next few months) the breakdown looks like this;
13 S. Jersey schools fall into the Top 25 or 52%
18 S. Jersey schools fall into the Top 50 or 36%
38 S. Jersey schools fall into the Top 100 or 38% over all for the 2021 season*.
If I’m being honest, the list is actually lower than I had hoped for but I’m not disappointed. In seasons past, I’ve witnessed schools from South Jersey, (ie: Camden, Woodrow Wilson(Camden NJ), Haddonfield, Florence Twp, Moorestown, St. Joseph, Paulsboro, Shawnee, Timer Creek, Cherokee ) just to name a few, who have won state titles.
South Jersey football has nothing to be ashamed of. And like they say in the pros say, "Any Given Sunday" they can hold their own against their NJ counterparts.
20-21 NJ High School Football Rankings (Source: Maxpreps.com)