Pirsig Now Plays for a AA Football School

[MaxyJR1]

New assignments for MSHSL are out. Blue Earth is now AA. 9-Man is now the biggest class. That tells you something about enrollment.


9-Man = 73 Teams
1A = 67 Teams
2A = 66 Teams
3A = 65 Teams
4A = 51 Teams
5A = 57 Teams

 

[goldengophers]

I wish they could reduce to 3 or 4 classes.

 

[MaxyJR1]

I wish they could reduce to 3 or 4 classes.

I think with the cost to commute kids around to neighboring towns for practices, the smaller classes will continue to grow. Schools will try to stay independent as long as possible. I think that "Section Football" will be assigned in the next cycle and there won't be any more conferences.

 

[GophersInIowa]

I think with the cost to commute kids around to neighboring towns for practices, the smaller classes will continue to grow. Schools will try to stay independent as long as possible. I think that "Section Football" will be assigned in the next cycle and there won't be any more conferences.

If that's the case, I hope they add one more regular season game and cut down on one playoff week.

 

[WolfontheProwl]

The talk

The latest talk is that we will have two classes of 9-man and three classes of 11 man football.

Not sure I like that idea but there are to many schools in the rural areas that simply dont have the numbers to put together teams. It is amazing the changes taking place across the state not only in football but in the other sports as well. The small schools continue to shrink at an amazing rate. Teams that are simply holding steady are seeing more schools drop below them than schools adding kids. I am located in the southwest corner of the state and I think 5 schools in an area bigger than 10 counties have actually seen enrollments go up and in a couple of those situations its because on a consolidation of schools not from an increase in population.

 

[Dr.Don]

Allright...What we need then, is one county wide school for each county. Then we have 3 classes: Small, Medium, Large. 87 counties in MN = 87 teams. 32 in Small brackets, natural power of 2 for tournament brackets. 32 in Medium brackets, natural power of 2 for tournament brackets. 23 in Large brackets with whatever they wanna do. Simple solution.

But then again, maybe not.

 

[disco]

And stop it with the 5A, 4A etc. Just call it A, B, C, D, E and 9-man.
Why does everything have to have an A after it, to make someone not feel bad about playing class D football?

 

[RodentRampage]

Allright...What we need then, is one county wide school for each county. Then we have 3 classes: Small, Medium, Large. 87 counties in MN = 87 teams. 32 in Small brackets, natural power of 2 for tournament brackets. 32 in Medium brackets, natural power of 2 for tournament brackets. 23 in Large brackets with whatever they wanna do. Simple solution.

But then again, maybe not.

Maybe not indeed. Our state's counties range from ones that have a few thousand people to ones with hundreds of thousands of people. They also range from ones with a very small area to ones with a very large area.

And parents would probably prefer that their kids not have to go 50 miles to get to school. Plus there is the whole thing that football isn't the purpose of schools.

 

[DrunkGopher]

Maybe not indeed. Our state's counties range from ones that have a few thousand people to ones with hundreds of thousands of people. They also range from ones with a very small area to ones with a very large area.

And parents would probably prefer that their kids not have to go 50 miles to get to school. Plus there is the whole thing that football isn't the purpose of schools.

Wait What???? When did that happen?

 

[Rosemountian]

They will add another class this spring. The goal of the classes was for no school have to play another school that has double their enrollment in the playoffs.

6A football will happen probably in fall 2012 or 2013 at the latest. The members of the lower classes will be adjusted accordingly.

 

[Zales04]

My high school dropped down to 9-man for next year I see. That is crazy. I would love to see a research paper done on how the baby boomers have affected the education system. I would assume less kids from the boomers plus families moving south and west really is starting to hit home the next few years.

 

[husker70]

The Local 11 is in a section only the MHSL could dream up. How do Saint Paul Humboldt and Minneapolis Edison fit into a Football section with Gibbon Fairfax Winthrop and Sibley East?

 

[Zales04]

The Local 11 is in a section only the MHSL could dream up. How do Saint Paul Humboldt and Minneapolis Edison fit into a Football section with Gibbon Fairfax Winthrop and Sibley East?

The same genius who put a school from Detroit Lakes in a section with Duluth Central probably - or Moorhead and Duluth East.

 

[Swede]

And stop it with the 5A, 4A etc. Just call it A, B, C, D, E and 9-man.
Why does everything have to have an A after it, to make someone not feel bad about playing class D football?

I played in Class C and never had a problem that. We played in a conference with several B schools and it made it that much better when we beat them. Now, who keep straight how many A's you belong to?

I frankly wish there were fewer classes. Why is there a need to crown so many champs? Perhaps what the MSHSL ought to do is have a metro and an outstate champ. Perhaps lump towns with population bigger than 10,000 into the metro division. Really anymore with declines in small towns and farm country, the trend is going to be to either greater consolidation and/or schools unable to field a team.

 

[Rosemountian]

I played in Class C and never had a problem that. We played in a conference with several B schools and it made it that much better when we beat them. Now, who keep straight how many A's you belong to?

I frankly wish there were fewer classes. Why is there a need to crown so many champs? Perhaps what the MSHSL ought to do is have a metro and an outstate champ. Perhaps lump towns with population bigger than 10,000 into the metro division. Really anymore with declines in small towns and farm country, the trend is going to be to either greater consolidation and/or schools unable to field a team.

The purpose of the size of the classes/number of classes when they were originally split into their current alignment was so that no team would be in a section with a school that was more than double their size.

 

[GopherRock]

That's the problem with having outstate 4A and 5A schools. There just aren't any good options for placing them in either leagues or playoff sections.

Also, keep in mind that this is for football ONLY. Most of the other sports do perfectly well on their own accord. It's football's scheduling issues that are raising the most stink, not the likely move in 4A basketball to a NCAA-style system of bracketing all 64 teams in the class.

 

[Zales04]

MSHSL doesn't care about outstate teams /Kanye

 

[pointer]

The Local 11 is in a section only the MHSL could dream up. How do Saint Paul Humboldt and Minneapolis Edison fit into a Football section with Gibbon Fairfax Winthrop and Sibley East?

If you like that, how about the MSHSL placing Duluth East and Duluth Denfield in the Mississippi 8 with Rogers, STMA, Buffalo, etc?

Nothing like driving halfway across the state every other week for a conference football game, huh?

 

[MaxyJR1]

If you like that, how about the MSHSL placing Duluth East and Duluth Denfield in the Mississippi 8 with Rogers, STMA, Buffalo, etc?

Nothing like driving halfway across the state every other week for a conference football game, huh?

This is not the MSHSL's fault. It is the conferences and schools wanting to play schools their own size. Schools are forming alliances and voting members out of their conferences. Would the Duluth Schools like to find 8 games on their own or 1-2? This is why section football will be here in 2013.

 

[pointer]

This is not the MSHSL's fault. It is the conferences and schools wanting to play schools their own size. Schools are forming alliances and voting members out of their conferences. Would the Duluth Schools like to find 8 games on their own or 1-2? This is why section football will be here in 2013.

I understand the MSHSL has had its hand forced here, but is there seriously not a closer conference to place them in? Central Lakes Conference for example. There has to be a better option than sending them down to the NW metro area.

 

[disco]

As Stillwater's legendary George Thole said, "why not give everyone a trophy."

There's no really good answer. Though I agree, fewer classes would be better, but the larger outstate schools are in a tough position. Schools like Moorhead are so isolated from similar sized schools in-state that travel becomes an issue. (The same is true for Superior and Ashland in Wisconsin). The Big 9, which is Faribault, Owatonna, the Rochester schools, Austin, Albert Lea and Winona have very long travel times as well.

It's even worse in a state like North Dakota, where you have the Fargo, Grand Forks, and Bismarck schools, and a couple other large towns scattered all over, like Jamestown, Devils Lake and Dickinson - you're talking about four hour bus rides for high school games.

The other issue we're starting to see in Football, is schools dropping down, not because of enrollment, but because of ability to field teams. Someone mentioned some of the Minneapolis and St. Paul teams. Decent enrollment sizes in some cases, but with no feeder program like the suburban schools, the programs are really weak. It's even spreading to the suburbs. Where I currently live (until we move in a month) we're in the Osseo school district, and where we live, the kids would go to Park Center. When I was in high school, graduating 20 years ago, Osseo and Park Center were big time athletic powers, and in the same section as where I went to school. Now, Park Center has dropped to 4A, not because of size, but for economic reasons. The school has a very poor economic demographic, and can't field the teams they once did. How do you determine that?

 

[GopherRock]

I understand the MSHSL has had its hand forced here, but is there seriously not a closer conference to place them in? Central Lakes Conference for example. There has to be a better option than sending them down to the NW metro area.

Grand Rapids was put in the Central Lakes. They're already looking at regular trips to Fergus Falls, Brainerd, Willmar, Cold Spring, and St. Cloud.

There are no opt-downs in section re-alignment. The likely reason why Park Center is this little nugget on the MSHSL web site:

The current enrollment formula is 9-12 enrollment - 40% of the Free and Reduced Lunch totals in 9-12 from every school.

Do you think that East Grand Forks is thrilled with being the smallest 3A basketball school?

 

[Bo Darville]

And stop it with the 5A, 4A etc. Just call it A, B, C, D, E and 9-man.
Why does everything have to have an A after it, to make someone not feel bad about playing class D football?

They should give the divisions names like Legends and Leaders.

 

[pointer]

Grand Rapids was put in the Central Lakes. They're already looking at regular trips to Fergus Falls, Brainerd, Willmar, Cold Spring, and St. Cloud.

There are no opt-downs in section re-alignment. The likely reason why Park Center is this little nugget on the MSHSL web site:



Do you think that East Grand Forks is thrilled with being the smallest 3A basketball school?

St. Cloud Tech and Apollo wanted into the Mississippi 8, that would have freed up some space.

 

[Ski U Mah Gopher]

Being a Highland Park Graduate, I shudder when I see the alignment of Section 2AAA:

Holy Family Catholic
Jordan
Washburn
Richfield
Highland Park
St. Peter
Waseca
Belle Plaine/Holy Family Academy

The official orphan section in AAA.

 

[Breakin' The Plane]

My high school dropped down to 9-man for next year I see. That is crazy. I would love to see a research paper done on how the baby boomers have affected the education system. I would assume less kids from the boomers plus families moving south and west really is starting to hit home the next few years.

It's an odd situation. When I graduated in the mid 90s, we had to move up from 9-man to C because the number of 9-man teams surrounding us all grew or consolidated and basically left us without a conference. We chose to play in Class C for the season rather than playing as an independent and having to travel the state looking for 9-man opponents. The downside was that we still had to play all of our away games 60 miles away.

 

[MaxyJR1]

Being a Highland Park Graduate, I shudder when I see the alignment of Section 2AAA:

Holy Family Catholic
Jordan
Washburn
Richfield
Highland Park
St. Peter
Waseca
Belle Plaine/Holy Family Academy

The official orphan section in AAA.

Holy Family is on it's way to 4A and Richfield is going the other direction. Le Sueur dropped to AA and Richfield comes in as the replacement. Holy Family will likely dominate this section for two years.

 

[Southoftheriver]

As Stillwater's legendary George Thole said, "why not give everyone a trophy."

There's no really good answer. Though I agree, fewer classes would be better, but the larger outstate schools are in a tough position. Schools like Moorhead are so isolated from similar sized schools in-state that travel becomes an issue. (The same is true for Superior and Ashland in Wisconsin). The Big 9, which is Faribault, Owatonna, the Rochester schools, Austin, Albert Lea and Winona have very long travel times as well.

It's even worse in a state like North Dakota, where you have the Fargo, Grand Forks, and Bismarck schools, and a couple other large towns scattered all over, like Jamestown, Devils Lake and Dickinson - you're talking about four hour bus rides for high school games.

The other issue we're starting to see in Football, is schools dropping down, not because of enrollment, but because of ability to field teams. Someone mentioned some of the Minneapolis and St. Paul teams. Decent enrollment sizes in some cases, but with no feeder program like the suburban schools, the programs are really weak. It's even spreading to the suburbs. Where I currently live (until we move in a month) we're in the Osseo school district, and where we live, the kids would go to Park Center. When I was in high school, graduating 20 years ago, Osseo and Park Center were big time athletic powers, and in the same section as where I went to school. Now, Park Center has dropped to 4A, not because of size, but for economic reasons. The school has a very poor economic demographic, and can't field the teams they once did. How do you determine that?

That's part of the problem with sectioning. It is based on enrollment. There is much more to success than enrollment and the free/reduced ratio was an attempt to fix some symptoms. The factor is what percentage of the enrollment is participating in MSHSL activities? Some schools have a much higher percentage of the population participating in activities than other schools. IMO schools that have a higher percentage of parents who are affluent, supportive, education is important type of people also have a higher percentage of students who participate in activities. Some schools claim to have 75% or more of their students participating in MSHSL activities. Other schools have much lower percentages of participation. The lower participation comes from many factors, financial, cultural unfamiliarity, language barriers, etc. If you are a school that graduates 200 with 75% of the students participating, you are far better off than a school that graduates 300 with 30% participation, especially in a numbers activity like football.

 

[RodentRampage]

I don't think it has anything to do with people having less kids, more to do with less jobs being available. For the most part, the boomer's kids are grown up. If it was just people having less kids, people would be flooding into the small towns to take the jobs. One thing that has happened is that small town businesses have a harder time competing with big stores in larger towns, as people are more inclined to drive for shopping rather than shopping in their home towns.

 

[Zales04]

I don't think it has anything to do with people having less kids, more to do with less jobs being available. For the most part, the boomer's kids are grown up. If it was just people having less kids, people would be flooding into the small towns to take the jobs. One thing that has happened is that small town businesses have a harder time competing with big stores in larger towns, as people are more inclined to drive for shopping rather than shopping in their home towns.

I know that happened on the Range. When I was in 1st, 2nd, 3rd grade every year we would see how many kids moved out of town. The mines went from employing something like 20,000 people down to 2,500ish during the recession of the 1980's. Walmart moved into Hibbing and just about killed the mall next door, and now if you need something you are probably within 15 miles of Grand Rapids, Hibbing or Virginia - all of which have big box stores.

Deep down it pains me to think that my hometown might lose half the remaining population in the next 20 years. When the taconite runs out, there will be ghost towns up there.

At some point in the future, do you guys think that aside from the larger cities that outstate schools will basically be unable to compete with the metro area? There is probably a really small percentage of a chance that could happen, but I just look at the hockey teams in NE Minnesota. Everyone shares with at least one other school, and one of these days there may only be 3 teams left on the Range.