MHSAA Football State Championship Dates “Will Be Monitored”

CLINTON, Miss. (WCBI) — Keep the calendars handy: the first football weekend in December may be changing here in Mississippi.

The 2014 MHSAA Football State Championship Games are scheduled to be played Friday and Saturday, December 5-6 at Davis Wade Stadium in Starkville. Those dates are not set in stone, though.

With the possibility of having a team from Mississippi playing in the SEC Football Championship Game that same Saturday as the MHSAA State Championships, there could be a schedule change from the MHSAA. 

“We are going to continue to monitor the situation but we have not made any decisions as of yet,” MHSAA executive director Don Hinton said in a phone call on Monday. “As the time gets closer, we will be sure to take a closer look.”

Mississippi State and Ole Miss are both 6-0 overall and 3-0 in the SEC to begin the season. Neither team has played in the SEC Championship Game since 1999 when the Bulldogs fell to No. 1 Tennessee.

“We want to make the best decision for our high schools and the university holding the game,” Hinton said. “But as of right now, nothing has been determined.”

The MHSAA Football State Championship Games recently moved from Veterans Memorial Stadium in Jackson to a rotation of Davis Wade Stadium and Vaught Hemingway Stadium this year.

Classes 1A, 2A and 6A play their state championship games on Friday, December 5th while classes 3A, 4A and 5A play their title games on Saturday, December 6th.

If the MHSAA does decide to change the dates of the State Title games, they could use Alabama as a model to follow.

The Alabama High School Athletic Association plays their State Championship games Tuesday through Thursday of that same week, December 3rd-5th.

Alabama recently added a 7th classification to their high school athletics which meant adding one more day to their State Title game schedule.

WCBI will continue to keep you updated on this situation and will have the very latest if anything changes in the future.