Northwestern will still be the team to beat in the upstate until someone actually does. Irmo has all the pieces of the puzzle to compete but I'm skeptical if that group can stay focused enough to compete for a state championship. Lexington should still be strong as well as Mauldin. In the lowerstate my pick is Spring Valley, who are just loaded with talent but it will be interesting to see how much success can be attributed to Davis in goal last year. I think Dutch Fork has the biggest drop off of anybody. If RNE can pull an upset, very realistic Dutch Fork is looking at a 4 seed in the playoffs.