The Polk County Champions league logo

The Polk County Florida Champions League has updated their logo.

The logo has always included two swans - the bird of Polk County.

The Swan Story

Lakeland, the largest city in Polk County with a population of over 128,000, was known for Swans beginning in the 1920's. The first swans were brought by seasonal guests of Lakeland and by the mid-1920's swans were plentiful across all of Lakeland's many lakes. However, 30 years of interaction with gators, dogs, and humans wiped out the swan population by 1954.

Queen Elizabeth II to the Rescue

Having heard about the disappearing swans, Queen Elizabeth II gifted Lakeland with two royal swans in 1957. Lakeland is known as the Swan City, and swans are plentiful once again. Swans are a jealously guarded species in Lakeland, with stiff criminal penalties to anyone that does harm to the swans.

Polk County Champions League

The Polk County Champions League is the second ever in the growing United States High School Champions league movement. Started by Mulberry High School coach and legend Chris Crawshaw in 2019, the Polk CL is an innovator. One of Chris' greatest achievements has been including all 25 Polk high school teams - large and small, public and private - into a three-division system of high school soccer teams complete with promotion and relegation. This collaborative effort gives every Polk team something meaningful to strive for and it cuts down on high school soccer mismatches.

It is hard to imagine a better example of Principle 4 of the 5 Principles of the US High School Champions League movement - Coach Collaboration.

This system has a chance to be a model for HS Champions Leagues across the country.

Polk is the 9th largest by population of Florida's 67 counties with a population of about 875,000 people.