First_Backer_Inside

About the only two national championship teams I put on a pedestal higher than any others is the '01 Hurricanes and '19 LSU team. Those two were, in my humble opinion, on a different level from other national champions. All other national champions, like you said, who cares where you rank, you are a national champion.

I don't think any of the schools in these counties have problems fielding teams. Most schools in this area, no matter how many students in the school, have enough of a football history for kids to get excited and come out for the team. I think this is the case for most athletics at these schools. What I fear for the state of Indiana, again I think these schools have great, full coaching staffs, is that schools will consolidate or lose sporting teams due to the lack of people wanting to coach high school football. The amount of jobs out there and still opening up is alarming to me. Maybe I haven't been coaching long enough and this happens quite often, but the closer and closer we get to the season and these positions not getting filled is alarming to me. I feel like I don't have enough time right now before August 21st gets here to get where we need to be. The rumors from schools I've heard is they don't have anyone applying for head coaching openings at schools. How are teams going to get a new offensive and defensive system in place in time for week 1 if they are still looking for people to apply in February. If you can't get a head coach at a school, how are you going to get assistants to help you at a school. Could this lead to consolidation between schools if there is a lack of coaches for multiple sports at a couple schools in the same area? I don't know, but it could be an option.

Should we expect the enrollment numbers sometime next week?

When my dad coached at Maconaquah in the early 2000's I remember going there for a game that got delayed for a couple hours it felt like. The team had to go hangout in the horse barn until the game started up again. I followed the team in there. When the team left for the game to resume, I didn't make it back out. The heated floor and warm straw made a perfect spot for my 4 year-old self to lay a coat down on and take a nap during the rest of the game. Those horses are treated very very...very well there.

First game as a head coach and I get to do it against the all-time winningest coach in Indiana History. What an amazing privilege and opportunity, can't wait for August 21st!

Pickles...consistent penetration...what team is this again?

Just what my old man told me every year I wanted to start a Sophomore I thought was ready to play varsity defense for me. Just something I keep in the back of my mind all the time now as I piece together depth charts going into a season. It usually fits a lot of the seasons we look back on. Jack Kiser was the only Freshman/Sophomore that played varsity for pioneer his Freshman year I believe. That team lost one game! (Just happens to be one of the greatest LCC teams to ever take the field probably lol).

You lose a game for every Sophomore you have to put on the field. Rochester started 2 sophomores this last year, one on offense and one on defense...our record was 9-2 last year. Our JV had a great year and a lot of the guys we are going to rely on this next year have caught up or even passed the guys we started last year as sophomores. There are benefits to getting a lot of game time reps no matter what level of football you are playing. Sad to hear it is being viewed as a status rather than an opportunity to grow and mature.

What @Donnie Baker says on the gridirondigest goes on the gridirondigest, STATE LAW!!!

Will be interesting to see for sure. I will say this about your statement. It wasn't until he left Maconaquah that they won a conference championship or a sectional title. His handful of athletes included two of the very best athletes the TRC has seen in the last decade. He then went to be the offensive coordinator at Ben Davis with way more than a handful of athletes and they couldn't win. The guy has a great offensive mind, but I think he over complicates the game at times. I hope he has a great defensive coordinator as well because his defenses at Mac were less than impressive in his time there. There are plenty of positives like you mentioned that he did at Mac, but there are also plenty of things he will need to improve on in his experience to have success at East.

I understand that this is the case if they are 3A enrollment, but they are right on the cusp of being 2A enrollment. What happens if they were to end up being 2A enrollment? Would they stay in 3A or drop down to 2A? From my understanding of what you have said, they would stay but it would be due to having the 4 points from last year alone. This is the only reason I can see as to why they would be different from the Knox situation, Cascade gained 4 points last year which that alone keeps them in whatever class they are in, Knox gained 2 points only from last year which doesn't put them in the 3 point threshold to stay in a certain class, so their enrollment determines where they go.

Either them, Chatard, or Memorial off the top of my head would be the only two competing with them for that. It does thank you! So based off of this if Cascade for whatever reason falls into the 2A enrollment they would still stay up due to the 4 points earned last year?

Knox is very intriguing to me. Win a sectional and a regional in 3A, and due to enrollment get rewarded with going down to 2A. Does enrollment trump success factor as long as you aren't getting enough points to be moved up? Knox has clearly earned enough points that if they were a 2A enrollment playing in 3A last year they would have to stay 3A. Just an interesting situation here with Knox. Not sure if this has happened before. Cascade is very close to being in the same situation. Win a state championship and possibly get rewarded with moving down to 2A depending on how the actual numbers look because they don't have enough points to be success factored up, but technically their points show they should be in 3A at least given the points they accumulated in the cycle. On the flip side of that we have Luers who didn't win a single state championship being moved up. Is there a possible flaw in the success factor and enrollment system based off of these situations, or am I missing something that says Knox and Cascade will stay in 3A due to the points they accumulated in a cycle?

I'm gonna be honest and it's not going to be a popular opinion, but for as much crap as he gets, Ballard really hasn't done that bad of a job. I mean if you look at our roster this last year, on paper we are pretty darn good. It comes down to execution with those players and Shane isn't getting it done. I understand injuries happen, but the glaring problem at the end of the season was dudes were injured and we still didn't run the ball with JT. Even when we did, it was constant inside zone. The creativity in the run game for Shane is non-existent. The one game we mixed it up a little was the Seahawks game with two running backs, and we had Seattle on their toes at times which is arguably one of if not the best defense in the league. There is no reason the Shane couldn't find a way to win one or two games at the end of the year. If anyone should be fired it should be both of our coordinators and head coach or at least before Ballard. I'm not a fan of Ballard, but I like him better than I do Shane or his staff. I just don't know how you have a RB who's on a record setting pace halfway through the year, and then decide to decrease the amount of usage for him. JT's numbers and success went hand in hand with our record this year. I don't think that is a coincidence.

Just speaking from my experience with them at our high school, we have worn the guardian caps for practice only the last 2 years. Before this, a lot of our concussions were occuring during practice time and not games. The last two years, we haven't had a kid complain about their head hurting or anything like that during practice. We have still had kids get them from games. Usually if a kid complains about more than one happening, we tell the player they have to wear one during games as well. In my experience they work, or they at least give the players a sense of security they didn't have previous to them wearing one. Whatever the case, I will stand by the idea that they are helping more than I will stand by the idea that they are doing nothing.

See I'm in agreeance there. I like a nice cut grass field over a turf field any day. But I also like it sunny and 60 degrees when I'm playing on it. It's the elements that I would agree at a championship level game I would not like to see impact the game as much. I also agree with Muda and it is apart of the game sometimes whether we like it to be or not. Have to adapt and find ways to win and i think the better prepared and better coached teams win those games more times than not. I'm sure there are plenty of times when they don't but I'm sure the same can be said for those perfect condition games as well, probably just not statistically as much as the ones affected by the elements.

Not trying to be a jerk here, just want to hear your opinion. Would you have a problem with grass if it was inside of a controlled environment? Like lets say the Colts decide to put grass inside of Lucas Oil, would you have a problem with it then or would you still want it to be turf?

Who's the one win coming against?

I believe what you are looking for is the "butterfly effect". You could play on a completely different turf field and that play would probably never happen due to alterations in the timeline having a ripple effect on the events that follow. So in a way you saying that this game would have had the same outcome on any turf field and not the one they played at isn't the greatest argument either lol.

This is kind of off topic from this specific game, but goes with end of game scenarios. Can the game end on a safety?

Legendary coaches don't usually get fired from every place they have coached at, usually schools hold onto legendary coaches as long as they can.

You can find him on maxpreps when you look up Rockville. Funny thing, he doesn't have one offensive stat recorded. Made a lot of extra points, and averaged 2 tackles a game on defense, but nothing for offense.

Yes Luers will be in 4A unless the IHSAA decides to change something with the success factor. I know it has been brought up as an issue, but I don't think that anything will be done yet as far as changing how the success factor works.

I've feared high school athletics is on borrowed time without this. Lack of students going out for athletics in a lot of different smaller schools. Lack of multi-sport athletes in a lot of schools. Athletes can get recruited through travel teams on a higher scale. NIL would be the icing on the cake. Unfortunate thing for many people who have grown up putting a lot of time in a sport and put a lot of time in after their playing days were over giving back to the games they grew up loving to see.

Only lists guys who played in the NFL. While it is a good list, I guarantee there were players from different schools on there that were not the best football player to come out of their given schools.