Coach Frank Beasley addressed a packed gym at Choctawhatchee High School on Thursday afternoon with a simple message: one more box to check.
- “We started this journey almost a year ago, we started in January,” Beasley told the student body. “And every time we break it out at the end of our workouts or anything we do on the field, everything we do, we always say, ‘State champs, on 3.’ That’s what we do.”
Now the Indians are two games away.
Choctaw (12-1) will host defending state champion American Heritage (Plantation) (7-5) in the Class 4A state semifinals Friday at Joe Etheredge Stadium. Kickoff is set for 7 p.m.
The Indians enter the matchup having checked off every goal they set back in January. They won the county championship, beating Crestview, Niceville and Fort Walton Beach. They captured the district championship for the third consecutive year. And last Friday, they traveled to St. Augustine and came away with a 31-28 win to claim the Region 1 title — their first regional championship since 2014.
- “We knew we had to get through St. Augustine to do that,” Beasley said. “We didn’t know if it was gonna be here or there. But we went over to their place, we took care of business last Friday night. So, we’re the Region 1 champions. We got one more box. We got one more box left to check. And that’s the state championship.”
The win over St. Augustine was another gritty comeback for the Indians, who trailed 28-17 in the second half before rallying behind quarterback Tamen Zabetakis. The game was sealed on arguably the play of the year — a fourth-and-inches direct snap to Carter Marracco after Zabetakis and Von’Tavious Keller distracted the Yellow Jackets defense by looking to the sideline for an apparent audible.
Now Choctaw gets what Beasley wanted: a Final Four game at home against a South Florida powerhouse.
“One of my other goals was to host this Final Four game in the Joe,” Beasley said. “‘Cause we knew if we got a team from Ft. Lauderdale that’s gonna come up here, or a team from Tampa or Orlando, they’re gonna come up here, they’re gonna experience something like they’ve never experienced before. They’re gonna run into the Big Green Machine tomorrow night.”
American Heritage defeated Archbishop McCarthy (Southwest Ranches) 25-20 last Friday to claim the Region 4 championship.
- “They may have this and they may have that, and they may have all this stuff…but we do too,” Beasley said. “We’re elite, that’s what we do. And we’re gonna get it done tomorrow night because we’re ready to check that last box and go win the state championship in Miami next week.”
The winner of Friday’s game will face the winner of Jones (Orlando) and Port Charlotte in the 2025 FHSAA Class 4A State Championship, scheduled for Dec. 10-13 at South Dade Kia Field at Pitbull Stadium on the campus of Florida International University in Miami.
