crimsonace1

He's 5-11, but don't let facts get in the way of a bad hot take.

Not only is this a cheap shot, it's also completely inaccurate.

It was a creation of the legislature when they got the supermajority and went full-bore with the Mitch Daniels/Tony Bennett butcher knife reforms. If Daniels & Bennett had their way, every single public school would've been converted to a charter school (and it's even been written in the law that any public school can voluntarily convert to a charter at any time).

He's injury-prone, but his talent is insane. He threw a couple of picks against Ball State in his first career start, but other than that, has done a decent job of hanging onto the ball. He can make throws - and plays - that stretch the defense. IU's offense is *much* more dynamic with Penix behind center, although Ramsey has always been a solid game manager who gets the ball to the right places.

Penix is the most talented QB IU has had since Sudfeld, for sure, and possibly since ARE. Ramsey is a good game manager. Penix is a unique talent ... and has three years of eligibility remaining after this year (and he's already burned his redshirt year). CTA was very adamant that Penix was the starter and he only "lost" the job because of injury. Ramsey does well, but Penix is the better QB and should be the starter if he is healthy. Meanwhile, Tuttle has already transferred once (from Utah to Indiana).

Charlie Spegal was named Gatorade Player of the Year for Indiana this morning. It's not Mr. Football, but it's pretty common for the recipient of this award to *also* be named Mr. Football.

Greg Werner (who is now an orthodontist on the east side of Indy), Mt. Vernon (Fortville)

NP exclusively runs spread and has traditionally thrown 20+ times a game under Coach Ralph, but went run-heavy as giving the rock to #32 was a pretty good offensive option.

... which is in the Zionsville school district (it's actually several miles north of Brownsburg and several miles east of the WeBo district line).

Any job is a possibility and I'm sure their AD will call, but he's got a pretty good situation where he is right now. At Fishers, you're likely dealing with some combo of Carmel, HSE, Westfield or any of the northside MIC schools every year in the sectional.

The Big Ten East has pretty much been OSU, MSU, UM & PSU in the top four, and IU/MD/RU fighting each other for fifth-sixth-seventh most years. The path to a bowl for those three teams is always going to be beat the other two, sweep the non-conference, and pick off one of the crossover games. IU this year went 3-0 in the non-conference, 2-0 against MD/RU and 3-0 in the crossover games (Nebraska, Northwestern, Purdue). Schiano may be well-known in the northeast, but Rutgers is an athletic department that has been in disarray for years. The benefit is, there's not a lot of P5 competition in the northeast for recruits (Syracuse, Penn State & Boston College are basically the only P5 teams in the northeast). But it's going to be a very slow build and Rutgers is budget-wise and facility-wise in the bottom tier of P5 schools. Right now, IU is the top of those three programs, but things are cyclical. What I like about IU is that most of the talent is frosh/sophs and Tom Allen is getting a lot of talent out of Florida and Georgia in addition to the recruiting base in the Midwest (especially IN/MI/OH). IU's recruiting under Tom Allen is as strong as it has ever been.

Anyone who doesn't vote for Spegal should just watch the TD run vs. Valpo and the one from last year's State Finals vs. Decatur Central on an endless loop.

Shelbyville will field a program next year, and for many, many, many years thereafter. In our area, Connersville, Greenfield-Central and New Castle have had years where they struggled, and have not only soldiered on, but have had some pretty good seasons mixed in. Shelby is three years removed from having consistent winning records. These things run in cycles. Programs DO NOT shut down due to results. They MIGHT shut down due to low numbers. No AD or school board member in his right mind goes "hey, we went 0-10 last year, might as well pack it up. Let 'em play soccer." An AD will say "look, we only have 15 players out for football, and that's not good for the health of our kids," but even then, they might suspend the program for a year or two and try to rebuild it by playing a JV schedule and investing in lower grades. 320 should be the magic number, not 280.

And, just to follow, how would Crawford losing football "make Indiana football better?" It would eliminate opportunities for about 25-30 kids, and Crawford is isolated enough that those players are likely not going anywhere else to "make a program better," and it's simply going to make a bunch of teams rearrange their schedules. This isn't college, where players live on campus, usually away from home, and can simply transfer to another school. For the vast majority of players outside of the largest metros (where football is pretty strong), transferring is not an option. It's eliminating and losing opportunities. The fact that Boone Grove, Forest Park, Hanover Central, Scottsburg, Oldenburg, Heritage Christian, Indy Lutheran, Attucks, Shortridge, et al, have added football in the last 20+ years (as well as a number of newer schools like Anderson Prep, Covenant Christian, Traders Point, Tindley) as well as Fishers splitting from HSE makes our game BETTER, not worse. Not all of those have been state-level programs - Lutheran and Heritage have played for state titles - but it creates new opportunities for people to play football. I was fortunate to watch a Forest Park QB run the show for Franklin and carry them into the D3 playoffs a few years back. The game grew to the point where it had to have six classes to accommodate the fact that 320+ schools were playing football. That's a *great* thing, and Indiana high school football has never been better. Eliminating opportunities in 40 programs like one poster here is openly advocating for would eliminate chances to play football for more than 1,000 players in our state (and that's not consolidation, as there would still be opportunities to play football at a consolidated school, but eliminating programs entirely).

Ah, DT again mixing up "contraction" (schools dropping programs) and "consolidation" (schools merging). I'm not sure why 280 is your magic number. I know you're often confused about the difference between high school and college football, but fewer schools does not mean more quality, because - outside of the largest communities, students aren't likely to jump schools. It just means fewer opportunities. If an isolated rural school drops football, that's 30 or 40 kids who simply won't get the opportunity to play football, not 10 talented kids that will go somewhere else. High school sports are about opportunities, and the fact that someone actually celebrates and gloats about reducing opportunities for participation in this great game on a high school website is absurd, but par for the course for certain people around here who traffic in absurd, off-base and usually uninformed hot takes. Those schools are consolidating due to finances and population changes in their communities. As Indiana suburbanizes, consolidation is a reality. But we may also see addition - like Fishers being carved out of HSE. Programs do not close for "poor results." They may close due to smaller numbers (and those are generally programs at tiny schools), but there are a lot of programs who went through 20+ game losing streaks that continue to run - and some are thriving.

Weight room strength, conditioning and speed/quickness can neutralize size. New Pal's D-line has a Big Ten DE who led the state in sacks last year on one side and a junior DE who has had FBS interest on the other, plus a very aggressive and talented LB corps. They're used to being outsized, but they've done fine. The other team has won 28 straight games and Friday's was the only one decided by less than 10 points. They're pretty good at football.

New Palestine's non-conference opponents for the next two seasons will be Decatur Central & Brebeuf Jesuit.

Obviously, this is a football site, but Providence has a powerhouse volleyball program, and Park Tudor had Yogi Ferrell, Trevon Bleuitt and a basketball team with 3-4 Div. I players (and a college coach running the show) pretty consistently for about a half-decade. Noll has fallen on hard times recently, but had a state-level program in the past in multiple sports. Heritage Christian built a powerhouse girls basketball program almost overnight, especially after Kelly Faris transferred in from Plainfield. Most p/ps only control their enrollment numbers if they reach building capacity, but otherwise, they're not going to turn down a check to stay in a lower enrollment class. I had a private school AD explain to me the main reason they're more successful is because they're parent-choice schools. Every single person in the building has intentionally chosen to go to that school for various reasons - academics, religious, smaller school, and yes, athletics. Therefore, you're going to have a greater percentage of the student body active and involved in school activites, including sports (and success is likely to attract parents/students who want that). In a sport like football, where numbers can make a difference, a school like Cathedral might have 600 boys, but 125 go out for football and another 350 involved in other sports, band, drama, choir, et al. A similarly-sized public school might have only 70 go out for football and 200 in other sports & ECAs. I'm not sure how much of an impact this has, and this isn't an issue in football, but in sports like volleyball, basketball, baseball, softball, et al, where travel sports have a *significant* impact, you've already got parents willing to pay thousands of dollars a year to showcase their kid on an elite team. They're more willing to pay tuition for a better athletic experience for their children, too. You tend to see more movement in those sports - even between publics - as players move to play with travel teammates, et al.

... longer than that. It's been a topic *every* offseason since they walked off the field at Columbus East in 2013, usually by people who don't know Coach Ralph, don't know his connection to the community, and assume New Palestine is some flash-in-the-pan podunk school that's a waystation to "bigger" programs. I'm not sure how much "bigger" you can get than winning two state titles in the second-largest class and being ranked #1 in the state in MaxPreps. "Bigger" is not always better. This isn't college football, where Alabama has deep pockets and can pick whomever it wants and then have access to the best players in the country. Because schools are 100% taxpayer-funded, "bigger" schools really can't offer much more in salary - especially given what NP already pays (which is among the highest in the state). Really, in the Indy metro, "bigger" is just going to a similar school that might have more students ... and if you're patient, New Palestine will be there enrollment-wise in a few years. Its development as a community is not dissimilar to Center Grove or Brownsburg, but the growth is coming about 20 years after those communities'.

Wondering if this was a case that because there was a game after, and they were trying to clear everything for the next game, because we're talking 4A game vs. the last game of the day ... noted below. There's almost always a Colts game on Sunday of Thanksgiving weekend, so I can see that Lucas Oil might need the stadium cleared quickly on Saturday night so that workers can get the stadium ready (TV people run cable, set up booths, take up the hashmarks, clean the stadium, re-set the goalposts to NFL width, et al). However, I can tell you that we stayed on the air until the last players left the field Friday night, and the lights were being dimmed on the field as NP's last few players were leaving. We had a sideline reporter getting some postgame interviews and did a long postgame. As we were leaving, the stadium staff turned the lights out on the newspaper reporters still working in the press box.

Valpo looked pretty physically tough both on video and in person. I was really impressed with their willingness and ability to play smash-mouth football. They're aggressive and come after you. They're one of the most physical teams I've seen all year. NP might be a little bit smaller pound-for-pound, but those players live in the weight room and condition for playing two ways four quarters and play relentless, physical football.

Every AD in the state with a job opening wouldn't be doing his homework if it didn't at least call. I don't know if that constitutes "interviewing." But there's a difference between taking a phone call. He can have pretty much any job he wants, and yet, he's stayed in NP for seven years. Meanwhile, two very high-profile coaches left MIC schools in the last five years to coach in the HHC, which tells you a lot about the desirability of jobs in this league and area of the state. The grass isn't always greener on the other side. New Pal isn't Mayberry - it's a growing, upper-middle class community 15 miles from downtown Indianapolis with a tremendous amount of community support and a passion for football. You don't find that everywhere.

The Hoosier Heritage Conference is a pretty tight-knit group of schools and nobody is going to leave the conference for football only. There's really no place to go at this point - the Mid-State is already at 8 teams and while NP plays a lot of those schools in other sports, it doesn't have a real rivalry with any of them. Conference Indiana is a poor geographic fit and the schools are all 5A/6A enrollments and either Marion County township schools or small-city schools. The HCC is also at eight teams and are all *very big* 5As or 6As. Coach Ralph has said *many times* how impressed he is with the quality of coaching in the league, and he just helped spearhead a youth football tournament for 4th-5th-6th graders at all HHC schools. Mt. Vernon, Pendleton Heights and Delta are all solid programs that are getting better. The conference will be very competitive next year. Now, it's hard to project a decade into the future, but it's not out of reach to see MV, NP and PH all topping 2,000 students given how quickly things are growing. MV's growth is explosive, PH's proximity to Noblesville and I-69 will likely lead to additional growth, and NP is in the beginnings of an explosion of residential growth that will likely increase high school enrollment by 250-300 in the next 4-5 years. New Palestine's a pretty good situation. Football-crazed community, very well-established feeder program, culture in place with kids buying in, a school that pays its teachers well, good administrative support, growing community. Why leave that to start over somewhere else?

As someone who had watched both teams play (one live, one on video) several times, I expected a close game. Valpo matches up better with NP than any team the Dragons played, but NP was the better team - especially given it had to revamp its offensive gameplan on the fly because of Roth's injury (which also affected the defense, as a couple of guys who might have gotten a breather on offense now had to play every snap since Roudebush had to move from WR to QB). The pick-6 was forced by NP's pressure and a DB being in the right spot. It was a great, well-played game. Now, the second point, I have no idea what you mean by "this will change when people move into your community." What will likely change is that there will be *more* people (so NP will actually be a 5A school by enrollment). I'm not sure what you mean by where HSE & Fishers are - they're pretty good football schools with a lot of recent athletic success. Same with Center Grove (a very similar community to New Palestine in terms of demographics and passion for football), as well as Brownsburg, Avon, Carmel, Zionsville ... a number of suburbs that border Indy have experienced a lot of football success along with growth. While the community is enjoying this run, we know nothing lasts forever, but three state championships and four State Finals appearances in six years - all but one in a higher enrollment class - is incredible and we'll enjoy it for a long time. This is special, we know it, but understand NP's success isn't just because of move-ins and growth. The vast, vast, vast majority of players on this team grew up in the youth football program - which is huge and well-organized. We have 50+ kids per grade in pads playing football going down to first grade. The high school program is *very* involved, and many former players are coaching and teaching in that league. The football culture in this community is unreal. Now, will you have a team like the last two seasons with multiple FBS-level recruits on the roster every year? Probably not, but you do have a foundation for sustained success that perpetuates itself. And, honestly, if you're looking for a home in the suburbs and your kid is interested in football, why wouldn't you consider New Pal?

Their school districts border each other, but Carmel's school building is north of Zionsville's (barely). It likely will be determined by sectional groupings (Z'ville is more likely to be grouped with its westside neighbors Pike & Brownsburg, while Carmel is more likely to be grouped with its Hamilton County neighbors, which would likely put Carmel north if one has to pick). Snider (north) & Columbus East (south) are Success Factor schools who will go back to 5A unless they win a regional next year. Wouldn't be surprised to see Valpo get back to state in 5A and thus trigger the Success Factor and go north. A lot of their playmakers were juniors (and Valpo's enrollment has dropped below 2,000, which seems to be sending it to 5A long-term). For schools in Central Indiana, north/south is rarely permanent because it's determined by a *lot* of moving parts.