Melbourne High Soccer Team Achieves Historic Milestone

Consider that in the state of Florida more than 100,000 kids play organized soccer – not counting school, church, city or Police Athletic League players; or those who are with non-affiliated clubs or informal organizations. With those, the numbers go much higher, especially in cities like Miami, Tampa and Jacksonville. Then consider that of all those thousands of kids and teams, one local area high school – Melbourne High School – has earned back-to-back state championships for both their girls’ and boys’ teams.

The point was proven again in January and February in Tampa, when Melbourne High School’s girls’ and boys’ teams, as well as Merritt Island’s girls, took Florida High School Athletic Association winter season titles in Class 5A (Melbourne) and 4A (Merritt Island) competition.

At the state tournament in Tampa held over January and February, Coach Rosie Lord’s Mel-Hi girls defended the school’s state championship by nipping Seminole 2-1 to win their second straight state title and end their season ranked #1 in the U.S. by ESPN Rise – the first #1 national ranking of a local high school athletic team.

The Lady Bulldogs were undefeated in two years, going 48-0-1 during that stretch.

Meanwhile, Coach Jerry McCabe’s boys hammered Seminole 4-1 to defend their state title and earn a #7 national ranking on the ESPN Rise boys’ soccer poll.

McCabe described the victories as “historic,” as both teams repeated championships earned a year earlier. The Dawgs’ girls also won a state championship in 1987 and the boys won one in 1994.

The Melbourne High soccer team victories are indicative of the strength and talent on the local soccer scene – Brevard County schools have won 12 state championships in this decade alone: three to Satellite’s girls (2002, 2003 and 2007); one each to Merritt Island’s boys (2009) and girls (2010); Melbourne Central Catholic’s girls (2003 and 2004) and boys (2003); and those back-to-back Mel-Hi boys’ and girls’ crowns (2009 and 2010).

Like we always say: Brevard County is #1 in the USA!