crimsonace1

It has been a long time since I'd been at CG for a game. Atmosphere is incredible. They make games a community event and put on a party.

I heard the same things from fans of other MIC schools, one in particular. One other thing I'd add is that not only is this team incredibly well-coached, getting it done in the weight room, has complete buy-in from throughout the program, and it's got a special senior class that's incredibly talented (with three players with D1 offers) ... the program is sound. There's a well-run youth league where players are getting good coaching and lots of reps starting in the first grade. There's a commitment to football throughout the community ... and that's likely to keep growing as the community grows. New Palestine is about to see a population explosion, as more than 1,000 houses are under construction or approved in the community right now.

And a guy you didn't mention, Kyle King, is headed to Michigan State. He could easily be the Mr. Football position award winner at DL.

If this were 1985, every major college program in the country would be lined up at the door. But he's projected as a fullback - a position few college teams use anymore. Charlie is faster than he looks. If he goes to West Point (which is one of the FCS schools where he has an offer), he'll thrive in their offense (and set himself up for life with a great education and a career as an officer in the military). Wherever he goes, he'll be a critical player for them.

Having witnessed many of his games, tonight might have been the most impressive. CG's defense is big, stout and fundamentally-sound. Charlie ran for 218 tonight - but of that, it was 128 on 15 carries in the second half. I wasn't expecting him to get anywhere near the record tonight, but I'm glad he'll have the opportunity to break it on his home field.

I wasn't suggesting rural areas can't compete. I was noting the demographic changes a number of rural county seats have dealt with. Marion has lost about 30% of its population since its peak and is now a 3A-sized basketball school. Frankfort has lost population. Anderson and Muncie have gone from three high schools to one. Martinsville, Blackford, Jennings County, et al, have seen significant changes. Greensburg & Princeton have been bolstered by Honda & Toyota. That doesn't always translate to "struggle to be successful on the field," but simply noting they're losing population and dealing with economic change, which can change the participation numbers and affect the competitiveness level in sports. East Central is exurban Cincinnati. New Prairie sits right between South Bend & Michigan City. NorthWood is a suburb of Elkhart. Mississinewa has absorbed a lot of the people moving from Marion and also serves the biggest employer of highly-educated people in Grant County in IWU. And none are rural county seat schools, which was the original point I made. Places perceived as suburban or exurban are likely going to not deal with the significant socioeconomic changes as county seat schools deal with factory closures and economic change. That's especially because county seats tend to have developed earlier and thus have older housing stock, which isn't as attractive to higher-income residents (who might be more likely to build a newer house in Pendleton or Yorktown than live in Anderson or Muncie), and those higher-income residents have more access to specialized training and programs (and this isn't an issue with football, but with many other sports - travel teams) that can impact a high school team's success.

I prefer to use the word "growth" rather than sprawl. The majority of Americans prefer to live in suburbs for a reason. We get the benefits of community - the feeling of being a part of a small town - while also being close to jobs. Indianapolis and Central Indiana's growth will certainly affect the donut county schools, and it should. New Palestine is actually the smallest public high school bordering Marion County (with the exception of Triton Central, but that is because Shelby County refuses to approve any new housing developments). New Palestine "benefits" by having good schools, a good community and, most of all, a great location. Our community's makeup, socioeconomics and development are similar to Center Grove (although CG is about 15 years ahead of us on the development arc) ... which is likely why there is so much mutual respect between the two communities and the two football programs. Property values are significantly higher here than in every school district that borders us *and* there's a building boom that will likely push NP into 5A by enrollment within the next few years.

New Pal scored 854 points in 2015. That had been the state record.

Also time for a generation of community change. Over the last 18 years, we've seen a generation of graduates leave smaller rural towns & rural county seats for larger cities/suburbs. Frankfort has seen about 5 percent population decline in that time. It also has a growing immigrant population (where football isn't as likely to be part of the culture). It's a big issue not just in Frankfort, but in a *lot* of rural county seats.

It's socioeconomics. Frankfort has a high transient and high lower-income population. Sports really aren't on the priority list for a lot of parents, so the kids are not as likely to participate (and those who do aren't as likely to play on high-level travel teams from the moment they start walking like kids in suburban communities do).

Charlie Spegal was at 7,699 rushing yards and 722 points at the end of last season (now at 7,880 and 746). Also, New Palestine had 54 consecutive regular season wins at the end of last season (now 55). There are a couple of other omissions for NP (10 sectional titles, 6 regional titles, 4 State Finals appearances). That 2015 New Pal team put up 7,701 yards in just 14 games, too ... they were in 5A and drew a bye in the first round of the tourney.

Post game broadcasts for the 2019 season. All New Palestine games will be on NewPalRadio.com, with coverage starting one hour before kickoff.

IMO, the main reason is because the football class alignments had already been announced before the bylaw change was proposed and voted on (the sectional alignments had likely also been put together). I don't know if it would have affected any other fall sports (volleyball the most likely), but those schools did not move up, either. Only the winter & spring. Bobby Cox hinted at this when the "stay up" threshold was lowered from 4 to 3. In an interview with Bob Lovell several years ago, he said quite a few members considered winning a sectional in the higher class to be enough evidence of success to stay up. I'm not surprised at all it was lowered again to 2.

Why has the MIC, arguably the best conference in the Midwest, stayed at eight ... as have most other leagues? Even when the MIC added Pike & LC, it did so by shedding THN/THS. The SAC is basically a municipal conference. The SIAC is geographically isolated and have all of the big schools AND the p/ps who play at a big school level in that corner of the state. Once Jasper & Vincennes got hung out to dry with Mt. Carmel being forced to leave the Big 8 (thus leaving the league at five teams), those two schools were essentially left without a league. Adding them keeps travel headaches at a minimum since those are essentially the only large schools in the area. Of the two leagues you mention, the HCC is at eight schools and doesn't really have a need to expand at the moment. Who would it pick up? Terre Haute North/South, possibly, but they are geographic outliers. Unless the HCC splits up and the western schools (Brownsburg/Avon/Zionsville) decide to join the Terre Haute schools. Bloomington N/S & Columbus North would make sense for the Hoosier Hills for a lot of reasons, and that's something I could see happening IF the BCSC board would allow North & East in the same league. Right now, CI is six schools who really have no place else to go after losing Martinsville, Decatur Central & Perry Meridian to the Mid-State. If one finds a landing spot, that could cause some dominoes to fall.

A lot of ADs see eight as the optimum number for a conference. Allows 7 football games, two non-con games, with no scheduling headaches because you can play noncon in Weeks 1-2 and conference games Weeks 3-9. Can play your conference basketball games on Fridays and spread them out throughout the year (or, for some leagues, B/G DHs in Dec/Jan). Allows for a double-round robin in baseball that only takes half the schedule. Ten makes the schedule a bit unwieldy. Six is too few. Any odd number creates headaches because someone is always going to be off.

Meanwhile, they increased funding for charter and voucher schools several orders of magnitude higher than the increase in public school funding. Rural schools are getting hammered because their enrollment is declining.

I teach economics. I work multiple side jobs, including one very visible one as the broadcaster for one of the five professional sports teams in Indianapolis. I basically work as an extra staff member in our athletic department running our website and broadcasts. I worked for a newspaper for nine years. I think I know the importance of businesses to our community, given we discuss it ALMOST EVERY DAY in class. These requirements are beyond insulting and essentially show the legislature is listening to the Chamber of Commerce instead of the Department of Education. The CoC is much more influential in dictating education policy than the DoE. I don't blame Jennifer McCormick for stepping away, but I wish she would remain. She's been the biggest advocate for teachers, but she's beyond frustrated with the actions of the legislature, which is controlled BY HER OWN PARTY. It's disgusting and insulting.

He was pretty open about his identity here when he was coaching at Howe and even before then. I wouldn't "identify" a member if it wasn't known, but he identified himself pretty often.

Whiteland is often really good and is very well-coached. They tend to go in two-year cycles, where they're loaded one year and then rebuilding the next (although they were 8-3 last year and sound like they will be pretty good again). Whiteland has also played the two closest regular-season games against New Palestine in the last six years. A potential path of Whiteland-Decatur Central-Bloomington South/Castle will be a gauntlet for NP to get to Lucas Oil.

Not specifically football-related, but longtime GID denizen LCCFan09er (Kristof Kendrick) has been named the new head basketball coach at Warren Central. Congrats.

After busing was implemented, some people called Ben Davis "Washington West" because so many of Indianapolis Washington's students were transferred to Ben Davis. But the natural rate of migration within a metro area also meant a lot of the old Washington High attendance area moved into Wayne Township. Now, we've been seeing over the last 20 years a lot of Ben Davis families migrating across the county line to Avon (and that's not an abnormal phenomenon - many of my classmates at Pike - many of whose parents went to Northwest or Washington or Broad Ripple - have their kids in Brownsburg, Carmel or Zionsville; Carmel also has a lot of the population that once lived in Washington Township and went to North Central, which in turn saw its boom after people moved north from Shortridge and Broad Ripple. HSE and Mt. Vernon both have a lot of former Lawrence Township families, New Pal has a lot of students whose parents went to Warren Central and Franklin Central).

I-69 being completed to Bloomington changes the calculus a lot. SW Indiana is now more accessible to the Bloomington area.

The IHSAA will minimize the drives as much as possible. There are three teams in the Region, so Jeff fits very well there as it's halfway between Hamilton County & Lake County, so it's got a drive either way. That allows for a grouping of four along the Toll Road corridor in north central Indiana, and there are three teams in the Fort Wayne area (counting Warsaw). Only one team was going to be sent north from Hamilton County and Noblesville is the farthest northeast team. It got the short straw travel-wise, but with 11 schools north of SR 26, someone was going to.

Interesting, the change has officially been made. That makes much more geographic sense. Attica is in 45.

I forgot 6/7 had switched numbers. The Southport/Perry Meridian sectional has historically been Sectional 7.