The good news: Tomball students will have a much shorter drive to most district games next year. The bad: Those district games may be much tougher to win.

The state released the new UIL district alignments for the next two years on Monday, and Tomball will see some changes.

First, the school moves to District 19-5A, as the state adds a new Class 6A for the larger schools.

Still in our district from this year’s 22-4A is Tomball Memorial, Spring Woods and district power Stratford. New to the district will be Waller, Brenham and the two Magnolia schools.

For coaches, the new district brings new challenges.

“Lots of familiar faces with some new teams thrown in the mix,” said baseball coach Joe Heckathorn. “Tough competition – Stratford and Brenham have great all-around programs that will be competitive in every sport.”

Band director Steve Fry said he is “very excited” about a district that involves much less travel.

“The schools are close to home, so it helps on travel and allows more parents to go to the games,” he said. “Hopefully we’ll get a bigger crowd coming to our home games with Magnolia, Mag West and Waller.

“All the stadiums are very good stadiums for the bands to perform in, so overall I’m very excited about this district.”

Basketball coach Brad Ball predicts Memorial, Stratford and Spring Woods will continue to be the teams to beat for his sport.

Sports isn’t the only area where district competition will increase. Clint Cottom, the theater teacher, sees a much stronger district for One-Act Play competition.

“It’ll be a bloodbath!” shouted Cottom.  “These schools will be much tougher in the one-act play. Spring Woods will be difficult. Magnolia will be very strong.”

Indeed, all academic events will be tougher.

“This will put us in a much tougher district for academic competition,” said Jerry Fordyce, Academic UIL coordinator for THS. “We are keeping a couple of schools that beat us in district last year, while the Magnolia schools, in particular, put a real emphasis on academic competition and will be very competitive.”