Frozen Tundra

I agree. Unfortunately, it happens all the time in college athletics. Those massive conference sizes don’t allow for a double round robin in basketball so they only play like half the teams once and the other half twice.

Conference Indiana did back when it was a 10 team league from 1998-2005. They always played a seven game conference schedule. The North Central Conference always plays a seven game schedule despite having ten teams.

Even if a merger did occur, I highly doubt they’d play a nine game conference schedule. Columbus North wouldn’t want that because they wouldn’t be able to play Columbus East.

Could you clue me in on the idea that Columbus East doesn’t want Columbus North in the HHC? Not saying you’re wrong but I’m an East alum and I’ve never heard this. Then again, everyone pretty much accepted that they each had their own conferences. From my perspective, North has always had a white collar mentality and has preferred playing the bigger schools in south-central Indiana as well as Indy area schools. On the flip-side, East has a blue collar mentality and prefers playing their traditional southeast Indiana rivals. While I am jealous of North’s strong commitment to athletics and their athletic brand, it should be noted more money flows into that school by way of a richer student population. Take a drive through both high schools’ districts and you’ll see what I mean. Nevertheless, I’d still like to hear what you know or think you know about East not wanting North in the HHC. I know there was some strong disdain between fans of the schools back in the 70s because North thought East took all the football talent. However, I wasn’t aware of any major disdain (such as what you’re referencing) occurring today.

Meanwhile, back to the topic at hand…😂

My thoughts and prayers go out to Coach Sharp, his daughter, and the family. With the season so close, this is a major blow. I hate it for the kids on the team. Coach Sharp was building something and I hope Justin Baldwin or whoever takes the job next year can continue it.

Jennings County’s Justun Sharp has stepped down as the head football coach. He posted the following on Facebook.

I’m impressed you have knowledge about a school in a county that borders Tennessee and Virginia. That’s nowhere near Indiana. Lol

Didn’t know much about Bell County except that, like Mount Vernon (Posey), their enrollment is in the 600s. Maybe I’m not giving those schools enough credit, but I penalized them both for that.

2021 Non-Conference Schedules BNL: at Martinsville, at Bloomington North, vs Madison Columbus East: at Whiteland, vs Columbus North, at Indianapolis Chatard Floyd Central: at Louisville Male, vs Louisville Manual, vs Silver Creek Jennings County: at Norwell, vs Brown County, vs Madison Jeffersonville: vs Bell County (KY), at Mount Vernon (Posey), at Silver Creek New Albany: at Bloomington South, vs Gibson Southern, vs Bloomington North Seymour: at South Dearborn, vs Brownstown Central, at Madison If you had to rank these non-conference schedules, what would you have? I think it’s really hard to decide the order of the top two because I don’t really know much about Louisville Manual. Looks like they won a bunch of state titles a long time ago but I don’t know how relevant they are now. I’d say Louisville Male is the toughest of any of the non-conference opponents but I’ll give the slight edge to East for the overall depth of their three games (sorry Silver Creek) plus the fact two of the three are on the road. 1. Columbus East 2. Floyd Central 3. New Albany 4. BNL 5. Seymour 6. Jeffersonville 7. Jennings County

Are you advocating for a pod system? Lol

Still wouldn’t work for conferences with an odd number of teams. There’s always going to be a week where a team doesn’t have a conference opponent.

More than nine-team conferences with eight conference games?

Yeah I completely understand. By no means was I favoring a nine game conference schedule. On the positive side, it’s super easy to schedule and you don’t have to worry about finding a non-conference opponent for a certain week. On the other hand, you don’t get a good grasp of how you measure up to other schools in the state. I know the Summit Athletic Conference has had a ten team, nine conference game schedule since 2015 and the Southern Indiana Athletic Conference started doing the same this past season. Nevertheless, the consensus from the players, coaches, and fans in the SAC is that they’d prefer to have non-conference games. Not knowing how they measure up to those outside the conference prior to tourney time is one of the reasons, but also that they get bored playing the same nine teams over and over again.

@DanteEstonia What’s your opinion on ten team conferences in which you play everyone and don’t have non-conference games? Like it? Dislike it?

They were somehow able to make it work for four years but I’m sure each year provides a new challenge due to the fluidity of the scheduling throughout the state.

Thought I’d post this article from the Seymour newspaper. http://www.tribtown.com/2021/05/14/three_local_conferences_to_have_different_look_in_fall-3/?fbclid=IwAR2Uoava93zYpYlYU-8n55TYDwdi-vp7sgkPI7KkgH9Ud9qdFCg08X8NC8Y The two main points as it relates to the HHC are: 1. Madison applied for membership to the Mid-Southern Conference. With Clarksville leaving the conference at the end of the school year, the MSC will be down to eight football schools (Brownstown Central, Charlestown, Corydon Central, Eastern (Pekin), North Harrison, Salem, Scottsburg, and Silver Creek). The MSC decided to put off a decision on Madison for now. It’ll be interesting to see how the MSC votes on Madison when the time comes. I can’t imagine it’s easy to play an eight game conference schedule in football. However, there’s no rule you have to play every team in your conference. We’ll see what happens. 2. No schools applied for membership to the HHC. Silver Creek and Bloomington North have been mentioned as either having interest or being the favorite to take Madison’s place. However, it looks to be hearsay. Maybe that will change down the road but, for now, the HHC is a seven-school conference.

Crazy to think Steve Cooley is now the longest-tenured coach in the HHC. He’ll only be in his fifth season.

As much as I hate to compliment our rival, I have to agree. They have such a good athletic program and there’s a lot of value to the school overall.

What’s the reasoning for why they wanted separation?

Yeah but Columbus North is the Bull Dogs (two words) so there’s that. 😂

Interesting. I had seen the student population had shrunk greatly over the last ten years but I didn’t realize they were considering going away from the three-school set-up.

What do you mean? I guess I’m out of the loop on this one.

Maybe. I’m surprised they didn’t try to apply. Conference Indiana feels like it’s on shaky ground. Maybe Columbus North has a lot of power within the conference. I don’t know.

It’s just a consequence of two teams being in the same conference. Didn’t bother me one bit.