crimsonace1

In a lot of ways, Burris (and when they existed, Bloomington University and Terre Haute State) were the state's first charter schools. Burris says it is a public school whose boundaries are the state borders.

I know the AD's answer will be to have a patch crew for one game. There's a LOT of revenue in Friday night, and canceling the game (or moving it to Thursday/Saturday) is really disruptive.

Preseason computer rankings are about as accurate as me throwing at a dartboard blindfolded (and I have terrible aim even when I can see the board).

Let's be honest - the primary reasons the Success Factor exists are Cathedral/Chatard football and Muncie Burris volleyball (and to a lesser degree, Providence, which at least once used the voluntary class bump to avoid Burris in VB). I wonder if Heritage Christian/Luers GBB and Park Tudor BBB in the Ferrell/Bleuitt eras might have also been factors. One could argue Burris might have been the primary driver in the SF, although they've lost their luster a bit since Steve Shondell retired.

We have posters from throughout Indiana. What are the top storylines in your conference, your area of the state, et al. In Central Indiana ... reclassification has really shaken things up. Cathedral in 6A - they won a sectional the last time but ultimately didn't stay up. This time, they're in a very winnable sectional with the Lawrence schools and North Central. Will this tour be different and lead to a potentially deep tournament run? Who else in the Indy area - traditional powers Carmel, CG, BD & WC or emerging programs like Brownsburg & Zionsville - will make a run? Obviously, the other big 6A storyline is the MIC shedding Carmel & CG and those two programs operating as independents. Can Decatur Central or Whiteland finally break through in 5A with Cathedral and New Pal out of the way? 4A looks loaded with Brebeuf, Roncalli, New Pal & Mt. Vernon all in the mix. Brebeuf, Roncalli & Mt. Vernon all experienced significant graduation losses, but have a lot of talented players returning, while New Pal won a sectional in 5A and has several key players returning, especially in the trenches. 3A - Chatard is back. When they've been in 3A, they've been dominant. There aren't quite as many schools in Central Indiana in 2A & 1A, especially with WeBo moving up to 3A. Lutheran & Covenant Christian have had great runs the last couple of years. Who becomes that team this year? Can Tim Able get Triton Central through the regional/semistate hump and to Lucas Oil in 2A?

Usually the Monday or Tuesday prior to Week 1.

Finding officials for one or two games is a lot easier than finding officials for 12, 24 or 48 games being played on Saturdays.

Two questions: Isn't WWE all scripted entertainment ... how could she be upset about "losing" a match that was completely choreographed? ... and two, Rudy is a pro wrestling official? That's awesome.

It's no secret the participation numbers are greater at p/ps than public schools (and the former AD at Cathedral has pointed that out to me in conversation more than once) and that's largely due to the fact that because your pool of students is people who are willing to pay tuition, they've already self-screened and are from the population of students/families that is *much* more likely to be involved in extracurricular activities (whether sports, band, choir, theater, clubs ...). The kids who just show up, go to class and then go home at the end of the day aren't as likely to have families who seek out a private-school alternative. In a system where schools are classified by enrollment, having a higher percentage of your student body available to play football (or any other sport) *is* an advantage. It's difficult to quantify how much of one it is, but it definitely is one. And once that advantage leads to a few titles, now the program sells itself to eighth-graders and their parents (which happens not just at p/p but also some public schools with strong programs).

2012: New Pal was 3-7 2013 (Ralph's first year): New Pal was 13-1, won a regional and went on a six-year regular-season winning streak. 2014: New Pal went 15-0 and obliterated the state scoring & yardage records. 2015: New Pal went 13-1 and was 5A runner-up to Snider in the craziest State Finals game ever played. They're *very* well-coached. Kyle Ralph sees the game incredibly well, teaches it well and has a system that's implemented all the way through the junior high. The football culture here is incredible - we have 30-40 kids a class playing in our elementary league all the way down to kindergarten. In their early era (the 2013-14-15 teams), they didn't have any Div. I recruits. Lots of talent, but they fit together very well and had a solid QB in Zach Neligh. The 2015 team basically played 14 guys, including some guys who had solid careers at St. Francis, Marian & UIndy. The later run - the 2018-19 titles - had some Div. I talent, and there's more high-level recruits walking the halls now than ever. So it's been built and now talent is cycling through, but part of that is the culture that was first born nearly a decade ago.

They're in Marion County. That's as "Indy area" as it gets. They're as much Indy-area as Snider is Fort Wayne-area.

NP was up 28-6 at halftime in that game, punctuated by one of the greatest runs I've ever seen by Charlie Spegal. New Pal largely grinded out the second half and ran out the clock. But, outside of the first-round game in the rain against Zionsville, it was the only game NP played that tournament that was decided by two scores. They were a juggernaut that year. That said, DC has had some *really* good teams but has had the misfortune to run into some generational teams. NP in 2018, Cathedral in 2019 (which in turn was wiped out by NP in the regional), and then maybe one of Cathedral's best-ever groups the last two seasons. They're a solid, well-run program with a lot of athletes and Div. I talent that annually has a chance to make a deep run.

The 6A/5A cutoff is 2,080 for this cycle but keeps moving up as schools get larger. DC is experiencing some growth but they're still the 15th-largest school in 5A (so squarely in the middle). A few others - Whiteland, Plainfield, especially - will likely get to 6A first and that requires some of the 6As to get a bit smaller, too.

He requested his account be deleted.

Let's conveniently ignore the two seasons before that, right?

The Success Factor has probably affected football and volleyball more than any other sports, but it's largely done what it was supposed to do - ensure schools like Cathedral, Chatard, Roncalli, Andrean, Evansville Memorial, Sheridan, Pioneer, et al, can't continually reload and win 4-5 state titles in a row in a given class. It giveth and it taketh away. I'm very tied to the New Palestine program. In 2013, the regional was New Palestine vs. Chatard, and was a great game that NP eventually won (and was a real breakthrough win for the program that had never quite been able to get over the regional hump in the previous two decades) ... as it was the first year of the SF and Cathedral, which had dominated the class, had been bumped to 5A. Cathedral went on to win back-to-back 5A titles while being a 4A-sized school, while NP and Columbus East had some generational talent and duked it out in 4A (and then both Success Factored up to 5A in 2015 and met again in back-to-back sectional tourneys, with the winner going to Lucas Oil). NP is back in 4A this year for the first time since walking off the turf at Lucas Oil in 2014. 4A would've been absolutely loaded those years had New Pal, Cathedral and Columbus East all been in the same class. But I've also known of programs that have had generational talent that win in a lower class, get bumped up and the team struggles (but likely would've struggled in the lower class). The constant tinkering early - lowering the threshhold to stay up from four points to three and then two - was frustrating because *twice* the tinkering kept NP up in a higher class, but NP obviously did pretty well in 5A. The IHSAA seems to like the system the way it is and it's likely going to remain in the current form.

I was trying to do PXP - thankfully, we'd seen MV enough that we could identify each player without really having to look at the jersey numbers. If it has the NFHS stamp on it, it's a legal football to use in a game, but yeah, just on sight, those don't look like balls I'd use in a game (especially if you're going to use the Wilson ball in the tournament - you don't want to be breaking in a new football in October).

True, but the NFHS & IHSAA uniform requirements are a bit more stringent (and the teams usually like to look a bit more professional).

I've witnessed it - several years ago, New Pal was hosting the sectional and Mt. Vernon (which had a new coach) and Shelbyville were slated to play. They go out for warmups w/warmup tops on. When they go to the captain's meeting, I notice both teams' captains are wearing white shorts. I look at my broadcast partner and say "this is going to be a problem." MV was supposed to be the visiting team and their coach mis-read the bracket (in his defense, for years, the team in the top of the bracket was the home team and it had recently been switched to the bottom bracket team being the home team) and brought the wrong uniforms. Because they couldn't delay the game for someone to drive to Fortville and bring the correct uniforms, New Palestine's old JV road uniforms were dug out of a storage room and MV had to wear those for the sectional game. I believe that happened again this year at a different sectional site. (In my basketball coaching days, we told our players to ALWAYS bring both uniforms to a tournament, even though the bracket clearly states which ones we're supposed to wear).

Correct. The IHSAA has a contract with Wilson and you can only use the Wilson ball in the tournament (IIRC, they'll provide you the gameballs the week prior to a sectional game so you can break them in during practice), so generally, teams only use the Wilson ball even though you can use any NFHS-approved ball with the NFHS seal stamped on it. Same in basketball - the Wilson Evolution ball has been the IHSAA's sectional choice for decades, so it's the only anyone uses in games or practices.

IMO, Marion would probably remain in that league as it's only a two-county drive to get to Lafayette and Kokomo is one county away. I could see the eastern NCC schools - Richmond, Muncie Central, Anderson - breaking away. All three communities have lost significant population and finances are tight. At some point, the travel is too much.

... and for those who follow the last point and say "but basketball has neutral sites." After the sectional, each basketball host has four teams (so only 1/4 of the crowd would be a "home crowd") - and there is a decent chance the host school or a nearby school from its sectional will be among the four and thus bring a "home crowd." Also, basketball requires a much smaller commitment. Smaller venue means fewer workers (for example, don't have to have a chain crew, there's less need to have people control sideline access, likely fewer concession stands) and they're indoors, rather than working outdoors in November for a game featuring two different teams. The amount of work it takes to put on a football game vs. a basketball game (even a *big* basketball game like a regional or semistate) is astronomically greater.

I like the idea of neutral regionals and semistates *in theory* but in practice, the last three weeks of the tourney are where the IHSAA makes its money to fund operations (sectional revenue is split between the schools). The main problem with going neutral is you limit the casual fans who will travel. Every community has that large throng that will come to a home game, but a significant number of those are the "we're here for the community event" crowd and won't travel. So you essentially have two "road game" crowds, which will hold down attendance a bit. Think of it this way - if we have a neutral site, I'll get, say, 60% of School A's usual home crowd and 60% of School B's usual home crowd. If the game is played at one of the participating schools, we'll get 100% of School A's home crowd and, because of the longer distance, School B only brings 50% of its fanbase. Assume each school's usual home crowd is 2,000 ... the neutral game brings in 2,400 fans (and thus $24,000 in revenue at $10/person). The "home" game brings in 3,000 fans and thus an extra $6,000 in revenue. Those are hypothetical numbers, and it changes. At a smaller, community-based school with a passionate fanbase, the differential between home/away might only be 15-20% of the fanbase. At some suburban schools where there are a ton of entertainment options in town and the fanbase outside of the parents is a bit more casual, a home game might bring in 100% of the fanbase but the road game (or a bad-weather night) might only bring in 20-25%. In theory, I like neutral sites as much as possible (and I think it's time for neutral semistates), but there's an economic reason they don't happen. There's another reason, as well - finding hosts. ADs and administrators are pretty tapped out by November. Assuming a different site for each game, you'll need 24 regional venues and 12 semistate ones. That's a lot of ADs who now have to work an extra few days (and putting on a football game takes a few days of work) and squirrel together game workers (concessions, chain gang, ticket takers, PA/scoreboard, custodial). The host site's expenses are covered and there's a small stipend beyond that, but the reward is primarily in concessions. The small financial reward isn't necessarily worth the work for a lot of ADs to host a neutral game. As a result, the IHSAA would likely have to "rent" facilities at a much larger cost than the typical $150 or so beyond expenses they pay a regional or semistate host now.

Maxpreps does. I'd use some combination of the two.

When I coached basketball, we tried to dial things back in the offseason because we a) encouraged our girls to play multiple sports, and b) tried to be respectful of their time. We'd do 1-2 open gyms a week in the spring, go hard in June with league play and a couple weekend tournaments, then hit the gym again in the fall 2-3 times a week in the run-up to the season. At the same time, we didn't push our kids into AAU programs. The better kids played AAU, the others didn't. AAU/club was a breeder of bad habits anyway. What happened? Our numbers dwindled, big-time, because those kids got into soccer (where they're expected to be on a travel team to play high school, and play travel year-round) or volleyball (where they're expected to be on a travel team to play high school, and play travel year-round, and where our varsity VB coach at the time used to threaten to cut kids if they played basketball instead of/in addition to club volleyball in the winter) or softball (which is a big deal at our school, and oh yeah, expects kids to play year-round travel). So, in trying to be respectful of our kids' time, we instead lost kids to other sports because basketball was seen as "less important" because we weren't pushing our kids onto year-round travel teams. The program has rebounded, in part because of kids who are dedicated basketball players and because we had age-group (school-based) teams playing in area leagues down to third grade, so because kids are playing "travel" or on "select teams" at younger ages, they're more dedicated and stick with the sport rather than getting plucked away by others. It's absurd.