We Speak High School Basketball
Tampa Bay’s Girls Run Through Class 6A: Steinbrenner’s Breakthrough and Bloomingdale’s Standard
If you want to understand Tampa Bay girls basketball, start in Class 6A — the classification where the area’s best programs keep running into each other, and into history.
Steinbrenner authored the breakthrough last season. The Warriors went 26-4, earned the No. 1 seed in Region 3-6A and reached the state semifinals at UNF Arena, where they faced a St. Thomas Aquinas team that went on to win the 6A title. For a program that had never been to a state semifinal, it was a season that rewrites expectations.
Bloomingdale remains the standard everyone measures against. The Bulls went 25-5 with a perfect 12-0 district record last season — and they arrived at the 2026 finals as the defending Class 6A champions, the team that set the bar Steinbrenner is now chasing.
The depth is the real story. Sickles’ girls went 21-9 and Armwood’s went 17-7 in the same classification, and Tampa Catholic’s season ended in a tight 57-52 loss to a Lake Highland Prep team that reached the Class 3A final. In Tampa Bay, 6A isn’t a bracket. It’s a gauntlet — and this winter it runs again.
We Speak High School Basketball
Remember These Names: E’zariyah Clark and Amira White Headline Florida’s 2030 Class in Tampa
They haven’t played a minute of high school basketball yet. In Tampa, people are already learning their names.
E’zariyah Clark arrives at Tampa Bay Tech as a 5-11 forward and combo guard in the class of 2030, playing club ball for HER Elite. Prep Girls Hoops’ evaluation reads like a varsity scouting report: a midrange game, range out to the deep ball, and rim protection built on length and timing — a freshman who “should be a key contributor for TBT alongside a talented group of guards.”
Across town, Amira White gives Plant a 6-0 power forward from the same 2030 class, playing for MBJ Elite. Prep Girls Hoops calls her “a major addition for Plant as the program looks to reestablish itself among the top teams in Tampa and across the state,” pointing to a back-to-the-basket game with an outside shot to match.
Florida’s 2030 class, as Prep Girls Hoops frames it, is a group whose size and length make them names to watch from day one. Two of the biggest are starting their careers in Tampa gyms this winter. Remember where you heard them first.
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