Tigers Return Several Starters from 2022 State Title Team
After winning the Florida High School Class 2S state championship last season, the Cocoa High Tigers could find themselves making yet another run at a state football title in 2023, and head coach Ryan Schneider isn’t shying away from the thought at all.
“We are in the best position we have been in in a while,” says Schneider, who is in is sixth season at Cocoa.
The Tigers return several starters on both sides of the ball from last year’s 11-3 championship team, and they have enjoyed a tremendous offseason so far, according to Schneider.
“Our kids have just been killing it in the weight room,” Schneider says. “They are super focused, and you can see that they have the desire to go back to back.”
Helping their chances will be the return of almost every starter from an offense that averaged right at 40 points last season.
Of the eight receivers who rotated in as part of the Cocoa High football offense, four return in 2023. That group includes junior Jayvan Boggs, who had 722 yards receiving with 6 TDs in 2022. Fellow junior Nicholas Teeter joins Boggs as part of the receiving corps this season. He too pulled in 6 TD catches last season. Senior CJ Bragg, who played some at quarterback, but was used primarily at receiver, also is back. He caught 8 TD passes while adding a rushing TD last season. It’s apparent from those three receivers’ numbers that Schneider believes in spreading the ball around.
“We don’t have that one dominant receiver who stands out above the rest,” he says. “We like to get everyone involved.”
Schneider should know a lot about that part of the game – he was a top high school quarterback at Plantation High School from 1996-1999 before heading to UCF, where he was the team’s starter from 2000 to 2003.
“I played in pass-friendly offenses in high school and college, so I’ve taken that same approach as a head coach,” Schneider says.
Speaking of quarterback, and specifically the Cocoa High QB situation, that is one of the spots on offense that Schneider will have to replace this season. Blake Boda, last year’s starter and the Florida Class 2S Player of the Year, has graduated and signed with Coastal Carolina. His replacement likely will be freshman Brady Hart, who Schneider feels is ready to step in and take over.
“Brady is an extremely talented player, and we think he’s going to be another great quarterback for us,” Schneider says.
Helping protect the freshman will be all five returning offensive linemen. In the offensive backfield, Cocoa returns junior running back Malachi Coney, who averaged 5.2 yards per carry with 3 rushing TDs last season.
“Offensively, I think we should be pretty good,” Schneider says.
The Tigers defense isn’t too far behind. They’ll return all four defensive linemen and their two starting linebackers from last year.
“The whole box returns this year,” Schneider says.
That includes 6 foot, 5 inch, 230-pound junior defensive lineman Javion Hilson, along with 6 foot, 3 inch, 268-pound senior lineman Loren Ward. The two have combined for 25.5 sacks and 124 tackles in their careers. The linebackers are seniors Dai’veon Parham and Smadrae Hawkins, who Schneider calls “arguably two of the best linebackers in our class.”
The Cocoa High football coach admits that the defensive secondary is young, but he says they’ll still have a lot of skill players ready to step up in 2023.
Leading the Tigers secondary group will be junior cornerback Joshua Brown, who enjoyed a breakout season last year. Brown came up big with two key interceptions, and he ended the season with 62 tackles.
“He’s our leader back there,” Schneider acknowledges.
The coach says one player they think is ready to step up is CJ Smith: “He’s a young kid, but we feel like he’ll able to help us in the secondary this year.”
Cocoa High is one of the state’s most consistent winning football programs, with 17 straight final four appearances in the state playoffs, including three trips to the state championship game in the past five seasons under Schneider. After dropping two of those title games, Cocoa was finally able to win it all last year in an overtime decision over Florida High School out of Tallahassee. It was the Tigers’ fifth overall state championship for the program.
“Cocoa football is running pretty well right now,” Schneider says.
In a state where transfers are making it tougher for teams to maintain a consistent winning football atmosphere, Schneider says he and his staff have worked hard to foster an environment where the players know they can be a part of something special. That means having the opportunity to play for a championship every year, although he’s not promising any one player anything.
“We are straight up with our kids about their role with the team, and their playing time,” he says. “If a kid is going to be a role player, we’ll tell him. It’s like our receiving situation I spoke about earlier: We are going to get several guys involved, and that has worked out well here. They get it.”
The key to another run at a state title may be getting out of the gate fast, and that won’t be easy in 2023.
“We start out with Orlando Jones, Venice, and St. Thomas Aquinas,” Schneider says.
But that doesn’t seem to faze Schneider’s team.
“Our guys don’t want to be great,” he says. “They expect to be great. They’re ready to go back to back.”
