Because everything old becomes new again, it’s not too much of a stretch to believe the most likely outcome for the current dispute among the football programs at Tennessee’s largest and mid-sized private schools in TSSAA Division II is that we’re headed toward a rebirth of the “Super Seven” league.
For those whose memory doesn’t reach that far back, or who weren’t around at all for the days when the Spice Girls monopolized music charts and private schools dominated prep football around the state, the initial public-private split began in the fall of 1997 with a group of just seven large private schools.
Nicknamed the Super Seven, it was made up of Baylor, Brentwood Academy, Christian Brothers, Father Ryan, McCallie, Montgomery Bell Academy and Memphis University School.
(Side note: As hard as it is to believe, both Baylor and McCallie struggled through the first couple of seasons, with the Red Raiders finishing 3-8 and the Blue Tornado 1-9 in 1997.)
After teams from outside of the Chattanooga area controlled the large private school league for two decades — teams from Memphis or Nashville won 17 straight state titles at one point — Baylor and McCallie began to offset the talent discrepancy between those bigger metro areas and the smaller pool available locally by utilizing their advantage as boarding schools, bringing in out-of-town (including international) athletes.