If you’re a fan of high school football and you’re looking for a quick fix to hold you over for a couple of months, the Brevard Passing League is a pretty good way to go. Many of the county’s top athletes are competing from about 10 or 11 teams. Four weeks have been played so far — here is a look at the rest of the schedule :

Monday, July 11: at Merritt Island
Monday, July 18: at Bayside
Monday, July 25: at Cocoa Beach

If you haven’t been before, there is no tackling. Running plays are not allowed. There are points for all sorts of things, including first downs, defensive stops on downs and interceptions. The games are played on a 40-yard field. The events are well-run, and as I mentioned above, many of Brevard’s best are out there. So if you’re in the areas of Merritt Island, Bayside or Cocoa Beach in the Mondays following the 4th of July holiday, stop by and check out the action.

Astronat’s Trey Simmons keeps his eye on the ball as he comes down with a touchdown catch against Merritt Island defenders during Monday’s Brevard Passing League game at Astronuat High School. / Craig Rubadoux, FLORIDA TODAY

Space Coast quarterback Nick Rittenhouse warms up with teammates before Passing League games on Monday, June 27, at Astronaut High. / Jim Cawley, FLORIDA TODAY

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From the Shameless Self-Promotion Dept. comes my TEDxNYEd Talk that I gave a few weeks ago. It was a real honor to be asked to do this talk, and I hope I did it justice.

I found it incredibly difficult to say everything that I wanted to say in 15 minutes or less, and as I reflect back on it now, I feel like a lot is missing. When I first started thinking about this talk, I wanted to speak more to parents than to educators, but I think I veered away from that a bit. And given the nature of TED Talks in general, I think at points I went too much into the moment as opposed to sticking to the bigger themes.

But overall, some rhetorical issues aside, Ill take it. The best part? I learned a lot in the process. I definitely felt pushed by the experience, and its given me a great deal of valuable feedback into my own speaking and thinking. It made me consider deeply the ways in which we can now craft our messages and offer them up to the entire world for inspection. Scary on many levels, but motivating on many others.

Now, if I can just get this down to under three minutes to really appeal to the short-attention-span culture that we find ourselves in

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The watchlist of high school football athletes for the Semper Fidelis All-American Bowl includes 120 athletes from Florida, the second most in the nation.

The group of 1,500 players gets narrowed down to 100 high school seniors from around the country to play in an all-star game with an East-West format.

• Related
• 2011 Broward High School Football Schedule
• 2011 Broward Football Districts
• Miramar’s Howard tops Broward Top 50 for Class of 2012
• Topics
• Miami (Miami-Dade, Florida)
• Jacksonville (Duval, Florida)
• Palm Beach (Palm Beach, Florida)
• See more topics »
  • X Tallahassee (Leon, Florida) High School Sports Athletes Tampa Palm Beach Gardens Lakes and Ponds Miramar Daytona Beach Panama Lauderdale Lakes Panama City (Panama) Pompano Beach Riviera Beach Palm Beach County Palm Bay (Brevard, Florida) West Palm Beach Hollywood (Broward, Florida) Clearwater (Pinellas, Florida) Broward County Fiesta Bowl Phoenix (Maricopa, Arizona) Jupiter Avery Johnson Cape Coral (Lee, Florida) Boca Raton Miami Beach Homestead

The game will be played Jan. 3, 2012, in conjunction with the Fiesta Bowl in Phoenix, Ariz.

Wide receiver Avery Johnson of Blanche Ely and defensive end Jelani Hamilton of St. Thomas are among the players on the list. Boca High running back Keith Byars Jr. and offensive lineman Avery Young of Palm Beach Gardens are among the athletes from Palm Beach County.

For more information about Junior Rank, please visit www.juniorrank.com .

List is alphabetical by city

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Here are some more noteworthy highlights from the 2010-2011 high school sport season to complement Joe Davidson’s year-in-review story in today’s sports section.

Legally blind athlete Kym Crosby, a distinctive presence on area tracks because of her bright red hair and pale skin, finishes as River Valley’s most accomplished track and field athlete. The Chico State scholarship signee sets school records in the 100, 200 and 400 meters and lands Tri-County Conference MVP honors after winning the triple jump and 400 and finishing second in the 200 at the league finals.

Sheldon, behind Bee Player of the Year Darius Nelson, plays one of the most ambitious boys basketball schedules in area history, competing in major invitationals in Southern California, Kentucky and Louisiana. The Huskies repeat as D-I section champions, but lose by two points to De La Salle of Concord in a physical NorCal D-I semifinal.

Davis’ Wade Allen wins the Sac-Joaquin Section 50- and 100-yard freestyle swim championships to cap an incredible run of 13 individual section titles by the Allen family. Jake Allen, now swimming at Stanford, won six individual titles; Trevor, now playing water polo at UC Davis, won three and Wade, the youngest, finishes with four titles.

Area baseball and softball players make the dramatic adjustment to two game-changing new rules. More baseball squads gravitate to small ball as hitters adapt to less explosive composite bats while softball gets an injection of offense with the pitcher’s circle moved back three feet.

Despite graduating all their starters and beginning anew under new coach Paul Hayes, there is no rebuilding for Woodcreek boys basketball. The Timberwolves make a return trip to the CIF Northern California Regional Division II championship game at Power Balance Arena, falling to parochial power Archbishop Mitty of San Jose.

The Davis girls soccer team, ranked No. 1 nationally most of the season, beats St. Francis to end the Troubadours’ three-year reign as D-I champions while another nationally ranked team, Rio Americano, finishes an unbeaten season by beating rival Benicia for the D-III championship.

With high-profile national recruits Vei Moala and Puka Lopa of Grant leading the way, 28 area players sign NCAA football national letters of intent. Cal and coach Jeff Tedford enjoy the the biggest coup in landing both Moala and Lopa. But the Pac-10 plucks six others – Grant’s Darryl Paulo, Burbank’s T.J. Poloai and Sheldon’s Mansel Simmons to Washington State; Grant’s James Sample to Washington; and Folsom’s Tyler Trosin to Oregon State.

Bonded by teamwork and a best-friend unity, Del Oro girls basketball enjoys its greatest run in coach Mike Takayama’s momentous 25-year career. Only nationally ranked St. Mary’s of Stockton can stop the 27-5 Golden Eagles in the postseason.

The Davis girls basketball team rebounds from the firing of popular coach Jeff Christian (and the reinstatement of twin stars Malika and Khaliya Wilkins who he had booted for “conduct detrimental to the team”) to win the Delta Valley Conference under interim coach Dennis Foster, the first-year athletic director.

UCLA scholarship signee and St. Francis four-year player Zoe Nightingale finishes as one of the area’s all-time greats by earning All-American honors. Only one other St. Francis player has done that, Troubadour coach Alynn Wright’s daughter, Taryn Wright.

Multi-talented Davis senior Ian Rock readies for decathlete duties at Duke by beating a loaded field in the rain to win the boys pole vault with a personal best 16 feet, 2 inches at the CIF State Track and Field championships in Clovis.

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Tempe Corona del Sol senior left tackle Andrus Peat, 6-foot-7, 308 pounds, a five-star recruit, gave me his top-10 list of college preferences.

Arizona State, Auburn, Florida, Florida State, Michigan, Nebraska, Notre Dame, Stanford, Texas, USC (Southern California).

There is no timetable to when he will commit.

He could wait until the February national letter of intent day like his brother Todd Jr., did last year when he announced he was signing with Nebraska.

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