A Texas high school football official has a problem with athletics-center private high schools like Florida’s IMG Academy.

Glen West, president of the Texas High School Coaches Association, has a good point when he warned that such schools could “destroy our profession.” The head football coach and athletic director at Brenham High School northwest of Houston also urged other public schools to refuse to schedule schools like IMG, which played a game last season in DeSoto, Texas.

“If someone is going to take my children, I don’t want them coming and playing in my backyard. And I don’t want them paying me to use my facilities so that can get them,” West said in this month’s issue of “Texas Coach” magazine.

The Florida academy he points a finger at was founded as a tennis boarding school in 1978. After IMG purchased it nine years later, its 500-plus acre campus features what it calls an “athletic college preparatory experience” in eight sports and it started playing football three years ago.

It has drawn the praise of LSU head coach Les Miles, among others, and recently had 18 graduates sign letters of intent to LSU, Michigan, Notre Dame, Florida State and Georgia, the big boys of collegiate football. 

And IMG is where Baton Rouge native Dylan Moses, the nation’s top recruit in 2017, will play next season after announcing his transfer in January. Moses, a dominant offensive and defensive player, committed as an eighth-grader to LSU but pulled his verbal pledge in August.

Room, board and tuition to IMG is $72,900. IMG specializes in training and tutoring athletes in preparation for college and allows them to graduate early, unlike University High, where Moses played three seasons.

West decries the fact student-athletes are leaving their communities with only a year or two remaining in high school. He counters implications that IMG does a better job preparing football players for college than coaches like him.

“I’m not after (only IMG) at all; it’s just that concept is something that hasn’t been that way for years, and I don’t see a reason for it now,” the Texas coach said.

DON SHOOPMAN

SENIOR NEWS EDITOR