2024 MN High School Football thread

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MaxyJR1 said:
However, when I hear how our youth football league can't get me a schedule because it's a mess due to all the trying to working around Hockey and baseball tryouts, it's annoying. Every year the league tries to cater to all the requests and the last minute teams that fall apart. 7th and 8th grade football in our league for games is basically trying to squeeze 10 games into a 7 weeks.

"Gotta be done by MEA for all the Hockey players."
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Yep. I'm not coaching this season, but this was a huge frustration the last few years when I was.
 

Based on my fairly close observation of one pretty successful metro area HS team over the past decade (and things may well be quite different in other communities), I'd respectfully disagree about the necessity of club baseball. With occasional exceptions for kids who are really gifted athletically, almost no one without at least some club background plays on the varsity at that school, and very few if any of the high end players at the school ever play American Legion. I know of one case where the coach discounted a rising senior's performance in Legion ball the previous summer by asking "can he hit varsity pitching?". Baseball may be the ultimate sport where you can't beat repetitions, and the club kids simply get more of them against better competition.
 

disco said:
I think this is true in general. People know who the really good players are.
At the same time, if the reason for playing club ball is because the kid really, really loves to play the game, that's okay too.

I drove by a youth field yesterday and the sign said "fall ball starts September 7." That just felt weird.
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For sure, if a kid just loves it that much and doesn't want to stop playing, that's cool and very OK. It's when they feel that they have to play to keep up with the Jones's, that's when it's a problem and too bad. Don't get me started on kids who's parents MAKE them play (during the regular season or after), that's just stupid. I saw a kid at my son's hockey practice once basically standing on the ice crying. I asked my kid what was wrong with him and he just said "oh, he cries just about every practice because he doesn't want to be here. His dad makes him play.". Honestly kind of pissed me off. How stupid.

I do know that there are some fall ball leagues for the younger kids that are just double header games only on Sundays (MYAS leagues). So that's pretty low key which can be fun if you get a group of friends together to play.
 

I just come at it from the perspective of a small-school guy. When I see a kid who would really help the football team or the basketball team, and that kid is spending all year focused on one sport, it just rankles my old-time sensibilities.

at a bigger school - let's say class 3A and above - one kid more or less is not going to make or break a season.

but at a smaller school, one gifted athlete not going out for football or basketball can make a big difference - even the difference between a winning season and a losing season.

now, if you're talking about an athlete who has a legitimate chance of a D1 scholarship or even a pro career, that's one thing. but if a small-town athlete is spending all year on one sport just to wind up at a D2 school, is it really worth it? in 10 or 20 years, will that athlete look back and say, "I regret not playing football or basketball."

end of rant. let's play football.
 

MaxyJR1 said:
Baseball has finally fully caught up to where Fastpitch has been for 20 years. Clubs and Fall Ball are huge and you can't blame the kids that love the sport when the summer season can be pretty short. I too have to challenge my old school thinking. However, when I hear how our youth football league can't get me a schedule because it's a mess due to all the trying to working around Hockey and baseball tryouts, it's annoying. Every year the league tries to cater to all the requests and the last minute teams that fall apart. 7th and 8th grade football in our league for games is basically trying to squeeze 10 games into a 7 weeks.

"Gotta be done by MEA for all the Hockey players."
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I think my younger kids youth hockey tryouts start on 9/18. Then the season starts right away following those. I get why you'd be annoyed (to say it lightly). September is football season, not hockey season.
 


JayBobDobbins said:
I think my younger kids youth hockey tryouts start on 9/18. Then the season starts right away following those. I get why you'd be annoyed (to say it lightly). September is football season, not hockey season.
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Yep, and I've said it before. We had kids miss football GAMES because of hockey TRYOUTS in the past. The hockey assn. more or less says - miss your tryout time and you're automatically on the bottom team. T.S.
 

xyz1 said:
Based on my fairly close observation of one pretty successful metro area HS team over the past decade (and things may well be quite different in other communities), I'd respectfully disagree about the necessity of club baseball. With occasional exceptions for kids who are really gifted athletically, almost no one without at least some club background plays on the varsity at that school, and very few if any of the high end players at the school ever play American Legion. I know of one case where the coach discounted a rising senior's performance in Legion ball the previous summer by asking "can he hit varsity pitching?". Baseball may be the ultimate sport where you can't beat repetitions, and the club kids simply get more of them against better competition.
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That's interesting, and I would believe you. It can definitely vary from school to school. My kids Legion team this year was basically the entire varsity team with the exception of two kids, one which would probably not have played anyway. We did lose a few kids to club tourneys a few times over the summer, but I think we had all of the kids for the end of summer sub-state and beyond. I do know that when we played other teams from our area, some of their best kids were not there, at least on that particular day. My kids team ran into a number of pitchers that were college level guys this summer. I'm sure it varies by school/team, weekend, etc.

Your last sentence is true though. Unless a person's athletic ability is off the charts (and even if it is), reps is what you need for baseball. And I feel like you do cast a wider net to play in front of scouts at those club tourneys.
 

disco said:
Yep, and I've said it before. We had kids miss football GAMES because of hockey TRYOUTS in the past. The hockey assn. more or less says - miss your tryout time and you're automatically on the bottom team. T.S.
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yep, you can miss tryouts but then you're on the C team. I'm not sure what happens in our association if you miss one tryout, but I'm sure it's heavily frowned upon at the minimum. The arrogance and self importance of the hockey community is irritating. I figured that would end after youth, but there's been BS in the high school levels in our experience too.

Sorry to disrupt the thread, back to our original scheduled programming (HS Football).
 

JayBobDobbins said:
yep, you can miss tryouts but then you're on the C team. I'm not sure what happens in our association if you miss one tryout, but I'm sure it's heavily frowned upon at the minimum. The arrogance and self importance of the hockey community is irritating. I figured that would end after youth, but there's been BS in the high school levels in our experience too.

Sorry to disrupt the thread, back to our original scheduled programming (HS Football).
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Yet we constantly get the GH argument that hockey doesn't affect football and no one can figure out why Minnesota doesn't have more D-I football recruits....

Years ago I suggested at a meeting that the Blaine associations should not allow parents or blood relatives to be on the boards and take local business leaders and interested neutrals. I had two parents tell me that they would shoot me in the parking lot. For real.
 



JayBobDobbins said:
yep, you can miss tryouts but then you're on the C team. I'm not sure what happens in our association if you miss one tryout, but I'm sure it's heavily frowned upon at the minimum. The arrogance and self importance of the hockey community is irritating. I figured that would end after youth, but there's been BS in the high school levels in our experience too.

Sorry to disrupt the thread, back to our original scheduled programming (HS Football).
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I think it's on topic because it DOES affect high school football negatively. I was talking to a friend last weekend who is a former varsity FB/BB coach and now an official in Wisconsin. They have no frame of reference over there just what a huge cloud hockey casts over other sports in Minnesota, at least in N. Minnesota and the metro area.
 

Slim Tubby said:
As a Coon Rapids alum, I challenge this theory.
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There is always this belief by the big schools that they are somehow more gifted because of enrollment numbers. And while this is often the case, the preseason 4 team scrimmage Jamborees often prove this wrong. In high school I loved playing at a small school and getting to play Tartan and hammering a team with 3 times as many guys on their sidelines.
 

WoodburyTim said:
There is always this belief by the big schools that they are somehow more gifted because of enrollment numbers. And while this is often the case, the preseason 4 team scrimmage Jamborees often prove this wrong. In high school I loved playing at a small school and getting to play Tartan and hammering a team with 3 times as many guys on their sidelines.
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There are always exceptions but in general the big schools are going to have a large advantage over the smaller schools in terms of numbers, resources, and talent.

Same holds true in D1 football. An FCS team can beat a power 4 team from time to time but if that same FCS team had to play a full power 4 schedule they would most likely really struggle to stay competitive.
 

MNVCGUY said:
There are always exceptions but in general the big schools are going to have a large advantage over the smaller schools in terms of numbers, resources, and talent.

Same holds true in D1 football. An FCS team can beat a power 4 team from time to time but if that same FCS team had to play a full power 4 schedule they would most likely really struggle to stay competitive.
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Oh absolutely, the advantage will always be there, but that doesn’t mean from year to year there isn’t a 4 or 5A that could be middle of the road or once a great while even better, than in 6A
 



I know this thread is about HS football but I have a lot of thoughts about club baseball. I started to write out a message but quickly realized it woud have further hijacked the thread and potentially doxed myself as well. Happy to discuss further privately if someone is interested.
 

On an encouraging note, I was told that there are 2 hockey kids from EP that will be starters (or at least major contributors) on the offense for EP this year. Add in Mason West still double dipping at Edina & it's a good thing to see.

Granted, I do think it unfortunately is the exception. West is elite at both sports & coaches will always make an exception for the elite kids. I think it's a little different for HS as well. Giles & Terwilliger can make whatever rules they want regarding tryout policy. Associations seem to be the hardliners. It would be an interesting test case sometime if a hockey association's best kid at a Pee Wee level actually chose to play in a football game over attending a hockey tryout & see what the association would do. Sadly, I believe the association would change their policy for 1 day & then go back to their guidelines....
 

FireDaveLee said:
On an encouraging note, I was told that there are 2 hockey kids from EP that will be starters (or at least major contributors) on the offense for EP this year. Add in Mason West still double dipping at Edina & it's a good thing to see.

Granted, I do think it unfortunately is the exception. West is elite at both sports & coaches will always make an exception for the elite kids. I think it's a little different for HS as well. Giles & Terwilliger can make whatever rules they want regarding tryout policy. Associations seem to be the hardliners. It would be an interesting test case sometime if a hockey association's best kid at a Pee Wee level actually chose to play in a football game over attending a hockey tryout & see what the association would do. Sadly, I believe the association would change their policy for 1 day & then go back to their guidelines....
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I think it becomes less impactful in HS when kids keep more to the season based on MSHSL rules for practice and play. 10th to 12th grade most multiple sport kids can/will focus on their season before moving to the next sport.

Back to tonight:

Maple Grove at Osseo moved to 4pm
Coon Rapids and Centennial move to tomorrow at 10am

1724952871753.png
 

Ironically, I saw a tweet today that Bloomington Kennedy is dropping hockey after this season. starting in 25-26, Kennedy will pair with Jefferson for hockey.

Kennedy's statement said (in part)
the population, demographic, culture and economy of East Bloomington have drastically changed. These changes contributed to a decline in East side participation at the youth levels in the sport.
 

short ornery norwegian said:
Ironically, I saw a tweet today that Bloomington Kennedy is dropping hockey after this season. starting in 25-26, Kennedy will pair with Jefferson for hockey.

Kennedy's statement said (in part)
the population, demographic, culture and economy of East Bloomington have drastically changed. These changes contributed to a decline in East side participation at the youth levels in the sport.
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Saw that as well. On the other side PACT Charter school in Ramsey is in their second season of Football. They are only playing a JV/B mix of games.

Coon Rapids is now Co-oping with Spring Lake Park for boys hockey. Girls have been with Champlin for a few years.
 

short ornery norwegian said:
Ironically, I saw a tweet today that Bloomington Kennedy is dropping hockey after this season. starting in 25-26, Kennedy will pair with Jefferson for hockey.

Kennedy's statement said (in part)
the population, demographic, culture and economy of East Bloomington have drastically changed. These changes contributed to a decline in East side participation at the youth levels in the sport.
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Wow.
 

MaxyJR1 said:
Saw that as well. On the other side PACT Charter school in Ramsey is in their second season of Football. They are only playing a JV/B mix of games.

Coon Rapids is now Co-oping with Spring Lake Park for boys hockey. Girls have been with Champlin for a few years.
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Didn't Spring Lake Park co-op with St. Anthony Village for a number of years? Is that still a thing?

There are a lot of really strange co-op arrangements for girls hockey. As much as the sport has grown, it's still not big enough for even some fairly large schools to field teams.
 

Wayzata - Lakeville South is pushed back to 8pm.
 

Blaine at STMA on as scheduled for 7pm, but may be pushed back if lightning still in the area.
 

The Kennedy thing is sad but inevitable. If you drive through East Bloomington it is quite apparent that this is not an area which economically can complete in today's insanely expensive youth hockey world.

Two Rivers-Mpls Southwest postponed to 10:00 Friday morning. Glad I'm not in charge of figuring out how to get refs to all the games they seem likely to reschedule.
 

xyz1 said:
The Kennedy thing is sad but inevitable. If you drive through East Bloomington it is quite apparent that this is not an area which economically can complete in today's insanely expensive youth hockey world.

Two Rivers-Mpls Southwest postponed to 10:00 Friday morning. Glad I'm not in charge of figuring out how to get refs to all the games they seem likely to reschedule.
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Well, the one thing is, there aren't as many Friday games because of the holiday weekend, but I'd suspect there are a number of officials who were scheduled tonight and had plans to go out of town.
 

Bayfield Gopher said:
I enjoy football fields. Agree. We drove by SStPaul stadium yesterday and wish I would have taken the time for a closer look,
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If you're low on cash, I you can bring a lawn chair and sit on the sidewalk on the hill north of the field (there is a tunnel under the road that allows kids to go to the practice field). Both teams have to come down the steps from the locker room to get to the field and the band forms a funnel for the team to run onto the field.

Unfortunately SSP has been down the past couple years.
 

WoodburyTim said:
Oh absolutely, the advantage will always be there, but that doesn’t mean from year to year there isn’t a 4 or 5A that could be middle of the road or once a great while even better, than in 6A
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I remember Becker beating Minnetonka in about 2015

Those games don’t happen EVER anymore
 

among the early kickoffs - Owatonna leading Hastings 50-0 in 3rd quarter. (according to the MN ScoreFeed app).

seriously, if you don't have the app, you should put it on your phone. in a lot of cases, you can get real-time updates on football, basketball, volleyball and hockey scores. they will also post links if there is live video of the game, which is how I found out that........

the game is on YouTube on Hastings Community TV. Owatonna just had a pick-six TD. the announcers are from Hastings and sounding a bit down.
 

short ornery norwegian said:
among the early kickoffs - Owatonna leading Hastings 50-0 in 3rd quarter. (according to the MN ScoreFeed app).

seriously, if you don't have the app, you should put it on your phone. in a lot of cases, you can get real-time updates on football, basketball, volleyball and hockey scores. they will also post links if there is live video of the game, which is how I found out that........

the game is on YouTube on Hastings Community TV. Owatonna just had a pick-six TD. the announcers are from Hastings and sounding a bit down.
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That's quite the beat down.
 



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