CCC FOOTBALL: Scheduling takes local private schools on different paths

As part of a difficult schedule, Ethan McBride and the Montgomery Academy Eagles will face 6A opponent JAG for the first time as part of the non-region schedule. (File Photo)

By TIM GAYLE

While a lot of public schools immediately posted their 2026 football schedules on social media, a lot of private school coaches held onto their schedules, uncertain what changes they would face in the new Alabama High School Athletic Association reclassification, which separated private schools into separate divisions from their public school counterparts.

There was also the matter of finding non-region opponents. If your team had success in 2025 and was predicted to be successful in 2026, it’s a safe bet that no public schools wanted to schedule you.

“I think the biggest thing is it’s really hard to play public schools,” said Catholic coach Aubrey Blackwell. “We haven’t played a lot of private schools here in many years and that’s (because of) us bumping up in classification. That makes it hard when your local teams don’t play (each other) and then when the new classification came out, some of the public schools were opting out of it as well.

“Teams that we have been playing in the past (won’t play now), with the exception of Eufaula. But it was extremely difficult to schedule. Every school within two hours got a phone call or a text message from me, asking them to play -- whether we went to them or played them here.”

Scheduling also became a challenge with different regions having different open dates.

“The first issue we ran into was the public schools are arranged in eight-team regions and they didn’t have a random bye, but a lot of us (private schools) were in seven-team regions, which means we had these random byes,” said Montgomery Academy coach Ethan McBride. “We have a Week 3 bye. There’s only three other schools in the entire state of Alabama that have a Week 3 bye and it’s three other private schools. So I reached out to those three schools and they were like, ‘no,’ so we have a Week 3 bye and there’s absolutely nothing I can do about this.”

Practice starts in two weeks for those schools that didn’t participate in spring workouts and game week for the season opener is only five weeks away.

Alabama Christian coach J.L. Dockins will inherit the schedule comprised by former head coach Michael Summers and it’s one of the more ambitious schedules in school history.

It includes region foes Montgomery Academy and Trinity in back-to-back weeks to open region play, but the non-region opponents include Oak Grove, Georgiana, Sweet Water and Wadley.

“We aren’t traveling a whole lot,” Summers said. “You look at what happened to Lee-Scott. We can’t afford $40,000 in travel so we stayed fairly close to home.”

The home opener with Oak Grove, Summers added, came after calls to find a season opener revealed “it was them, Daphne or Pell City. He had guys step out on him and as soon as I committed to him, I had (another opponent) call me and I couldn’t back out on him.”

Georgiana and ACA have a relationship through seven-on-sevens, Sweet Water was a deal made through the former coach and Wadley “reached out to me.

“How I always schedule is this: if you get to a (playoff) tiebreaker, I always wanted to schedule teams that I thought we had a chance to win, but that they were going to win seven or eight games. It always made more sense to me to play a really good 1A or 2A school than to go play a 5A school that’s going to go 3-7 but will be just as tight as that 1A game.”

2026 ALABAMA CHRISTIAN SCHEDULE

Aug. 21 -- Oak Grove -- Home

Aug. 28 -- Georgiana -- Away

Sept. 4 -- *Montgomery Academy -- Away

Sept. 11 -- *Trinity -- Home

Sept. 18 -- *Prattville Christian -- Home

Sept. 25 -- Sweet Water -- Away

Oct. 2 -- Wadley -- Home

Oct. 9 -- *Fort Dale Academy -- Home

Oct. 16 -- *St. James -- Away

Oct. 23 -- *Pike Liberal Arts -- Away

Oct. 30 -- OPEN

Catholic coach Aubrey Blackwell called virtually every team of comparable size in the state before landing non-conference foes Eufaula, Montgomery Academy and Briarwood Christian.

“We’re thankful to have the schedule we have,” Blackwell said. “We feel it’s very competitive. It’s going to be a challenging schedule, which is what we want. We want to play tough games.”

Tough games are one thing but the Knights face a daunting five-week stretch that includes road games with Briarwood, UMS-Wright and St. Michael and home games with St. Paul’s and McGill-Toolen.

“It was just the draw and we were given what we were given by the AHSAA,” Blackwell said. “The private schools weren’t split by size. I wish we had a better understanding of how they drew the line.”

 Three of the state’s largest private schools are on the schedule, which have twice the enrollment of Catholic.

“We’re in the 200s and most of them are in the 300s all the way to the 700s,” Blackwell said. “We’ve been playing up. Last year, they played up two classifications (as a 3A school playing in Class 5A). So playing up is not something new to us, but having three or four 6A schools on the schedule is a little different. We’ve played Vestavia Hills and have had Saraland on the schedule, but we haven’t had this many. It just means we have to prepare our kids the right way.”

2026 CATHOLIC SCHEDULE

Aug. 21 -- Eufaula -- Away

Aug. 28 -- Montgomery Academy -- Home

Sept. 4 -- *Faith Academy -- Away

Sept. 11 -- *Houston Academy  -- Home

Sept. 18 -- *Glenwood School -- Home

Sept. 25 -- Briarwood Christian -- Away

Oct. 2 -- *St. Paul’s Episcopal -- Home

Oct. 9 -- *UMS-Wright -- Away

Oct. 16 -- *McGill-Toolen -- Home

Oct. 23 -- *St. Michael -- Away

Oct. 30 -- OPEN

Montgomery Academy coach Ethan McBride has a difficult non-region task as well, opening with Tallassee and Catholic, followed by a mid-season game with 6A JAG and a season ender with St. Anne Pacelli.

“The opener was a game (Tallassee) we wanted to continue,” McBride said. “In Week 5, we reached out to the JAG coach (Delancey Tolliver) and we just felt like with all this separation of public and private, us and JAG are a stone’s throw from each other and have never played each other. Now more than ever, I think both of us thought our community needs to come together. Football does that. Football brings people together.”

Catholic and Montgomery Academy haven’t played each other since 2023 despite their status as Capital City Conference rivals.

“I’ve got a lot of respect for Aubrey,” McBride said. “For us, it was a matter of right place, right time, trying to get that (rivalry) back started. Now’s the right time to try and mend some of that and come together to compete against another CCC school.

“We love that. When I first moved back to Montgomery, the Capital City Conference was a cool thing that not a lot of folks have.”

The other CCC teams are all part of the same region.

“You’ve got a lot of teams that have been in the AHSAA a long time, some that are fairly new to AHSAA, you’ve got teams that are going to field rosters of mid 50s and some that will field rosters in the low 30s,” McBride said. “For us, our goal is just to go out there and be the best version of ourselves that we can be.”

2026 MONTGOMERY ACADEMY SCHEDULE

Aug. 21 -- Tallassee -- Home

Aug. 28 -- Catholic -- Away

Sept. 4 -- *Alabama Christian -- Home

Sept. 11 -- OPEN

Sept. 18 -- *St. James -- Home

Sept. 25 -- JAG -- Away

Oct. 2 -- *Prattville Christian -- Away

Oct. 9 -- *Pike Liberal Arts -- Home

Oct. 16 -- *Fort Dale Academy -- Away

Oct. 23 -- *Trinity -- Away

Oct. 30 -- St. Anne Pacelli -- Home

St. James first-year coach Hayden Stockton said he had no problem scheduling opponents and likes the non-region opponents Dadeville, Jemison and Sylacauga on the 2026 schedule.

“Some teams had reached out to me prior to the release (of the new alignment) and for us, where we were in classification and with smaller junior and senior classes this year, I thought it would be in our best interest to schedule those teamsm” Stockton said. “It’s a lot easier to find a schedule when you’re 3-7 than when you’re 10-0. People tend to reach out to you.”

The Trojans also had Tuscaloosa Academy on the schedule, but had to scramble to find a replacement when the Knights’ region added another team.

“It took me a while to find a replacement,” he said. “I actually had to give away Week 9 and play (Lamar School from Meridian, Miss.) on Week 5. I know (Lamar) Coach (Stacy) Luker. He just took that job at Lamar and he called me up because he needed a Week 5 game and he’s kind of in the same situation, in a rebuilding stage. I thought it would be a good matchup for us.

“A two and a half hour trip is something we can use for practice run in case we are fortunate enough to make the playoffs and I thought it would be a good opportunity for our kids to just get out of the state and play somebody different.”

The Trojans don’t have Catholic on the schedule, but the other four Capital City Conference rivals are also region rivals.

“It looks a lot better than it did (in Class 4A) last year, to me, because I’m new at this and playing the private schools will renew some rivalries, like ACA, we haven’t played in a couple of years,” Stockton said. “I’m in a learning curve. We’ve all got to sit down and figure out what the ‘new’ looks like to us. It’s going to be an interesting year.”

2026 ST. JAMES SHEDULE

Aug. 21 -- Dadeville -- Away

Aug. 28 -- Jemison -- Home

Sept. 4 -- *Pike Liberal Arts -- Away

Sept. 11 -- *Fort Dale Academy -- Home

Sept. 18 -- *Montgomery Academy -- Away

Sept. 25 -- Lamar School -- Away

Oct. 2 -- *Trinity -- Home

Oct. 9 -- *Prattvlle Christian -- Away

Oct. 16 -- *Alabama Christian -- Home

Oct. 23 -- OPEN

Oct. 30 -- Sylacauga -- Home

Trinity coach Brian Seymore found two public schools to open the 2026 season and two private schools to round out the Wildcats’ non-region schedule.

“I know (scheduling) was very tough, especially for a lot of private schools,” Seymore said. “I feel like there is a little bit of division between public schools and private schools now and for some reason, people aren’t crossing over (to play the other division) like we had hoped. I’m very fortunate that I built some relationships in public schools for 20-plus years. We were very fortunate to get Bibb County. Matt (Geohagan) is on the Central Board and I think he saw it may be tough to get a game, so he reached out to me about playing. I’m thankful he did that. 

The next week, the Wildcats will play Reeltown at home.

“Coach (Matt) Johnson and I have a relationship, having been my defensive coordinator at Andalusia,” Seymore said. “That’s been a tough game for us the past couple of years but I feel like we need to play it because it’s a tough, hard-nosed game. They’re going to play very physical. That gets us ready for region play.”

The other two non-region games are road trips to Lee-Scott Academy and Westbrook Christian.

“I’ve been trying to get Lee-Scott on the schedule,” Seymore said. “I think that’s good for us. Very similar with regards to sports across the board. I think it’s going to be a very competitive game.

“The other non-region game is crazy because we drew Week 7 (as the) open (date). I reached out to all the teams with Week 7 open. Steve Smith, the longtime coach at Piedmont, has taken over at Westbrook. I’ve known Steve for a long time. It’s a long way but they’ve got a really good program, we feel like we have a solid program. It will be a great game.”

Among the region opponents, one game that stands out is the regular season finale at home against Montgomery Academy.

“I imagine they’re one of the early favorites in A (Private),” Seymore said. “Hopefully, the region championship is on the line in that game.”

2026 TRINITY SCHEDULE

Aug. 21 -- Bibb County -- Home

Aug. 28 -- Reeltown -- Home

Sept. 4 -- *Prattville Christian -- Home

Sept. 11 -- *Alabama Christian -- Away

Sept. 18 -- *Fort Dale Academy -- Home

Sept. 25 -- Lee-Scott Academy -- Away

Oct. 2 -- *St. James -- Away

Oct. 9 -- Westbrook Christian -- Away

Oct. 16 -- *Pike Liberal Arts -- Away

Oct. 23 -- *Montgomery Academy -- Home

Oct. 30 -- OPEN