CYPRESS — When it comes to competitive sports, what happens when you’re the third largest school district in Texas?

Cypress-Fairbanks ISD has 12 high schools with varsity sports, but in Texas high school football there are only 10 weeks of regulation play. To have an annual shot at every CFISD team, your home team would have to battle for 11 consecutive weeks of district play. The math just doesn’t work with UIL limitations.

Earlier this year, the University Interscholastic League took the opportunity to fix Cypress’ dilemma by splitting the school district right down Highway 290.

The northern schools were realigned into District 17-6A and will go into the Region 3 playoff brackets. Conversely, the southern schools were placed into District 14-6A and will go into the Region 2 playoff brackets.

Week 1 of the football season is Aug. 30 through Sept. 1. The regular season will run until the week of Nov. 8-10. Teams have 11 weeks to play their maximum of 10 games.

Playoffs start the following week of Nov. 15-17. Playoffs run for six weeks, culminating in four days of football madness just before Christmas. Since all Cypress schools are 6A, they will only have a shot at the final two prearranged games.

For any teams lucky enough to play (and hopefully win) a state title, they will be playing Saturday, Dec. 22. If Cypress has a Division I game, it’ll kickoff at 3 p.m., and a Division II contender will start at 7 p.m. The 6A state title game will be at the AT&T Stadium in Arlington.