Twin Valley Raiders just finished a perfect 10-0 regular season — bumped up a section, still ran the table — and the community packed the stands, because Friday night football is one of the last places in American public life where merit still decides who wins.
Across Pennsylvania, Florida, Illinois, and Missouri, high school football playoffs opened this weekend and towns showed up in force. While school boards obsess over ideology and administrators rework curricula to fit the latest political fashion, the football field remains stubbornly binary: you gain yards or you don't. The scoreboard doesn't care about equity adjustments. Parents notice the contrast — and it's part of why they're pulling their kids out of the classroom and into the bleachers.
The Raiders, elevated from Section 4 to Section 3 in the Lancaster-Lebanon League, capped their perfect season with a 28-9 win over Cocalico on Friday, the Reading Eagle reported. Maverik Foster rushed for 169 yards and three touchdowns on 14 carries. Lucas Myers added 111 yards on 12 carries. Twin Valley racked up 386 total yards while holding Cocalico to 215. The Raiders have now won 21 consecutive regular-season games. Their last loss came in last December's PIAA Class 4A championship against Southern Lehigh. They enter the 5A district tournament as the top seed with a first-round bye.
Down in Florida's Treasure Coast, Vero Beach extended its winning streak to seven games with a 21-12 victory over Eau Gallie, according to TCPalm. Freshman quarterback Makai White threw three touchdown passes — connecting with Sebastian Cabrera from 44 yards, Marcus Melbourne from 38, and Jake Tell from 6. Vero Beach enters the FHSAA postseason as the top-ranked team in Region 2-6A.
Also in Port St. Lucie, Treasure Coast shut out Legacy 33-0 in what TCPalm described as the inaugural "Tackle The Stigma" game — a mental health awareness initiative now layered onto the sport. Running backs Aidan Pierre and Adam Serieux accounted for all five touchdowns. Treasure Coast, winless in 2025, now sits at 6-4. Legacy finished 3-7, held scoreless in its last three games.
Illinois opened IHSA playoff brackets across eight enrollment classes Friday, the Peoria Journal Star reported, with championship games set for late November. Missouri's district playoffs kicked off around Springfield the same night, per the Springfield News-Leader. Dozens of communities, dozens of games, one rule: win or go home.
The same schools that can't teach math without embedding critical theory can still field a team where the best players play and the hardest workers start. That discipline — show up, produce, earn your spot — is exactly what's being stripped from the classroom. The Raiders earned every yard this season. The open question is how long the people running American public education will tolerate a space where the scoreboard can't be reprogrammed.
