Welcome back from a great holiday vacation BCAA sports fans. I trust that everything you put on that list showed up under the tree of around the Menorah candles this year.

As we get back to promoting and keeping an eye on the BCAA, I want to take you back a few weeks - before you shut it down for the holidays and enjoyed some much needed family time.

With the North-South game in the books, the attention was on Orlando, where the St. Thomas Aquinas Raiders faced off with the pre-season top team in the state, Tampa Plant.

This was a Raider team that was never challenged throughout a season that saw them start near the top with wins in Dallas and at home against Georgia power Camden County.

This was a season that saw the career of record setting quarterback Jake Rudock come to an end, but not before head coach George Smith and his impressive football team won yet another 5A state title, completed a 15-0 season and give this team national recognition for the second time in three years.

Thanks to what St. Thomas has accomplished two of the past three years, what Lakeland and Miami Northwestern did the years before gives Florida an impressive 5 of the past 7 mythical national championships..

That’s right, right before the holiday vacation began here in Broward, St. Thomas once again carried the flag for not only the BCAA, but the entire state of Florida when the Raiders went to Orlando and finished off the Panthers and caught the nation by storm - again!

The 29-7  win helped the Raiders complete their third perfect season in school history (1992, 2008) and won their third state championship in the past four years.

This year, while the offense did its thing, it was all about a defense that contained Plant star tailback James Wilder Jr., the Class 5A state Player of the Year, limiting him to 72 yards on 21 carries and one touchdown. The defense yielded an amazing 97 points all year

The Raiders stopped Plant (12-3), which won the Class 4A title in 2008 and moved up to Class 5A last year, with solid pass defense. Plant quarterback Phillip Ely completed only 13 of 35 passes for 166 yards and did not throw a touchdown pass and was intercepted twice.

St. Thomas is the first team in South Florida to accomplish the feat in the playoff era that began in 1963. The Raiders won their 52nd game in their past 53, and are 57-2 over the past four seasons.

St. Thomas won its sixth state championship overall -- all under Smith, who moved into a tie with Lakeland's Bill Castle for second on the state's all-time list for coaches. He is three behind Jacksonville Bolles coach Corky Rogers' nine state titles.

You can reach Larry Blustein via e-mail at Floridakids1@hotmail.com. Blustein is the co-host of the High School Gridiron Show each Wednesday night from 9-10 on WQAM (560 AM) or www.wqam.com.

You can also follow us on Twitter at: www.twitter.com/larryblustein