PDB26

Yeah, I think Penn is staying put and hoping someone––anyone––joins the NIC.

Good news, I've heard there's a three year extension on Penn's NIC contract.

It's hard to imagine Carroll and Crown Point not squaring off in the regional. Bearish on the Kingsmen and all the way out on Elkhart. Regardless, it's getting hard not to mentally advance Carmel to Thanksgiving weekend.

Yeah because even a wash in this scenario is a loss. Unless Bardo transferring is more of an addition by subtraction situation.

It's an interesting question. The simplest answer is mojo. Be a winner, seem like a threat to make noise in November, and play as many interesting opponents as possible in the regular season. Do the games make it worth it for the average community member without a player on the team or a family with young kids––even with free tickets––to invest three or so hours and a little hassle on Friday nights in the fall?

Yeah, lots of great players from Grissom and plenty of good teams through the years. Still, participation started to fall off out there about twenty years ago, and it sounds like nothing has changed. I have wondered how many of the Madison Township families end up going to Wa-Nee or Bremen schools since open enrollment began. I’d guess the number of relocations is about the average for a school that isn’t in an economically distressed area, but I could be off. I haven’t been able to get back for a game in three years, but I always felt like there was a notable drop off in Friday night’s importance to the community fifteen years ago give or take a few. The community’s relationship to the program went from “we used to suck but now we’re great,” to “we’ve always been great,” to “we used to be great but maybe we’re not so good.” For those of us who were connected in some way to the first group it might be, “oh no, (do) we suck again.”

100% Carmel too low, possibly by a lot. Not sure about Concord’s inclusion since that program yo-yos wildly imo. Mishawaka is interesting. Part of me says too high, maybe not in the t25 at all, but their style of play would keep them in a lot of games that otherwise they would have no business being in.

@Justasportsfan But, for the sake of discussion, this is also not a new development. Coaches were at lunches during the season at Grissom begging kids to come out twenty years or more ago.

The perception of Penn is rightly negative, while, having started at the bottom, Elkhart's perception has been bolstered by competence and an influx of talent over recent years. It will be interesting to see where Elkhart's program goes from here, but neither Penn nor Elkhart––with not a single other 6A program on their schedules––belong in the same sentence as Carroll at this point. The same is likely true with CP, unless that program has experienced an unsustainable rise on the strength of a couple of classes as I've seen suggested. Still, CP's recent results speak for themselves so far as Penn and Elkhart are concerned.

I don't see an NHL team in Indianapolis ever, either. Four franchises are in close proximity and two of those cover the Indianapolis tv market already, plus the NHL's expansion strategy has been to go to the west and south to more populous markets. If Houston wants a team and Atlanta wants to try again, I'd be shocked if they didn't get teams. The NHL wants to be in Phoenix, but can't go back until the arena situation gets sorted out there. Houston, Atlanta, and Phoenix are all top ten in metropolitan population, while Indianapolis is outside the top 30. Indianapolis would probably be behind Quebec City all things considered. Indianapolis would probably make for a good American Hockey League affiliate if the Fuel weren't already in the picture.

I agree, generally, that the probability of starting for a team with 49 rostered players––according to MaxPreps, for what that's worth––is higher than it would be at a school like Carroll, but that general probability also decreases with each additional transfer––if we assume that roster size will remain relatively stable year over year. Probability doesn't do anything to address the question of why we should assume the underclassmen and backups transferring from large schools will be better or more likely to play than those staying at small schools.

I'm questioning the premise that underlies the speculation of underclassmen transfers from large schools to small schools: why would your average 10th grader at Penn be better than your average 10th grader at Bremen, or your average 10th grader at Westfield be better than your average 10th grader at Sheridan?

I'm uncertain why many seem to think that your average underclassman/backup at Large School X will walk into playing time at Small School Y simply by virtue of having been at Large School X.

As does Michigan.

My guess is any effect by voucher expansion and the new transfer rule will be negligible. First, the median household income in Granger is just under 120k(2023). Certainly, some well-off families in the district will have access to vouchers for the first time, but I doubt that was ever a hurdle they were unwilling to overcome previously. Next, I could be wrong, but I don’t think Penn was ever in the business of preventing athletes from playing at a different school under the old rules. Finally, I wouldn’t be so certain that your average backup at Penn just walks into playing time at Marian or St. Joe. Seniors have always gotten the first rights at playing time when in an even competition with underclassmen. So, even those who eventually get beat out won’t know until they’re into their senior year. If a rising senior preemptively transfers for playing time there’s a good chance they’re not a shoo-in to beat someone out elsewhere. Maybe a rising junior decides to transfer because they’re behind a senior and don’t expect to beat them out, but that junior will have had significantly fewer reps against good competition in their careers—when compared to a junior or sophomore at either Marian or St. Joe—unless they were part of a rotation in varsity games. Penn’s developmental teams are almost always playing against vastly smaller teams whose best underclassmen are getting time on varsity as sophomores and juniors while the typical Penn player doesn’t get regular quality reps until they’re a senior, and even that’s dubious considering the way the schedule plays out now. So, there could be some movement from Penn to Marian and St. Joe, but I’d be shocked if the effect is even remotely analogous to what waiverless transfers have had on college football programs taking the best backups in the country from SEC teams.

I imagine the language pertaining to semesters gets sorted out once they talk to more principals unless they’ve treated trimester schools as though they were two semester schools in the past when adjudicating issues. It possible they just collapse that third semester into the second of whatever year the student is in. Not sure why they’d do it that way, but IHSAA. That’s an interesting thought about a lawsuit. Are rising seniors actually damaged by the new rule? So far as this release is concerned, it’s hard to say, but maybe they are. That’s a good point about the IHSAA calendar year. It seems like using the IHSAA calendar to qualify students would be the most equitable and in the best interest of most students.

I don't have any gripe with the free transfer rule, but the limited 30-day provision seems reasonable. I guess, if I had to amend the provision, I'd institute the 30-day period only in cases where the athlete hasn't actually changed addresses. It's probably a good thing for the IHSAA to consider the interests of all involved: parents, remaining or transferring students, and schools. I'm not sure I'm following the argument where "staying and building somewhere" is important but then there is a problem with a provision that would likely protect many student athletes who intend to stay with one program through their senior year. I'm about to straw-man your argument a bit, but I can't think of anything more memorable than being a mercenary athlete playing my senior year with a bunch of guys I've known for five minutes. Seems like a rule that will encourage athletes to transfer earlier––which is probably better for everyone. Programs have a huge interest in keeping as many 18 year olds as possible, and the athletes who remain in one program through their senior year deserve a little consideration, too.

I'm really not sure what to say about Penn (and Elkhart). The old two-division NIC offered Penn a lot of scheduling flexibility. I think, don't hold me to it, but I think Penn and Carmel were slated to start up again prior to the implosion of the NIC's small-school division. For now, it seems Penn has chosen to stick with Valpo and Mishawaka––both fine programs in their own right––which would be a defensible decision if they played a schedule that was rounded out with seven games against 6A opponents instead of six games against mostly underachieving 5A, 4A, and 3A programs plus the one run with Elkhart. I don't think this is the reason Penn would be perceived as a second tier 6A program. I think we'd all agree Penn's high-water mark was from about 1995-2002, give or take, but, despite carrying on for another 15 years within arms reach of that level, they really fell off following the 2017 season––notwithstanding a handful of nasty results in the tournament/state finals during that stretch. I think you could explain away the handful of bad results in the tournament from 2003-2017, but Penn's struggles throughout the last six seasons certainly give the impression that Penn has slid all the way into a second tier of 6A football. Outside of taking CP to the wire in 2023, they've had nothing to hang their hat on coming out of games against peer competition. They absolutely have to find a way to increase the quality of the reps that guys are getting throughout their years in the program––which, to me, is the thing that has separated the central Indiana 6As from the rest.

I'm guessing most athletics departments are still operating closer to or at the margin––with some notable exceptions in the Big Ten and SEC. IU stepped on a landmine with the Allen contract, and then had to cover Cignetti's buyout, too. Ohio State reports nearly $10 million in severance payments for that year, plus they lost two home football games from '22 to '23. For years, Notre Dame's bean counters could reliably predict future deficits based on the opponents on the home football schedule alone. But no athletic department is in the red from paying players either, yet.

No.

Yeah, I don’t really believe them.

Yeah, it’s not like any other youth/feeder programs anywhere use their local school district’s facilities for anything.

99.9% fired after two unranked seasons unless they include two wins over Michigan.

I can understand the decision. To me it’s a pick ‘em. Ohio State’s ability to zone it up and match zone inside the 10 is just a huge problem for this ND offense at 4th and 9 from the nine. QB run is out at that point, and ND had just had three unsuccessful passing attempts in four plays. ND had its first real successes on long conversions on that drive so it’s frustrating, but they were able to stretch the field in a way that’s not possible inside the ten. We all saw what Ohio State did to Texas in the same situation in the Cotton Bowl. The odds are against you either way, but scoring on 4th and 9 and getting three two point conversions in one game against this defense is just about as far out there as getting two more possessions in the first place.

Read an article in the Tribune that failed to address that. I had wondered if he was given the option to resign.