Why does Minnesota HS football only play 8 games?

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AO54 said:
In this state, the kids from the inner-city and 1st ring suburbs prefer playing basketball.
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That's not true. They just go to different schools who have better football programs. Some of the most successful football programs in the state are chock-full of inner city / 1st ring suburb kids. They attend schools with better football programs. A significant portion of our state's best football players are from these areas.

You see them stay in their home school more (but not always) for basketball more because you only need a couple kids to turn around a program. It's the nature of the sport.

Every single year, there is a lot of talent from these areas. Occasionally, those athletes stay at their school. However, even if they stay, they aren't good enough to allow those programs to beat the big boys (Gjere, Hageman, Rucker) or they attend private schools (Henderson, Floyd, Onwualu).
 

discochris said:
A very good example of this is Park Center. Back in the late 80's, early 90's when I played, Park Center was a major athletic school. Fast forward to today, and I think they've had to drop to 4A for football based on income and participation. They're still a big school (though the district going from 2 to 3 high schools has changed that a bit) but they're relatively poor demographically.
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There are still some good football players who were originally from Park Center, they just rarely go to Park Center HS.
 

maroonfive said:
It is interesting to look back and see that Bloomington once had 3 high schools, Edina had 2 high schools, Hopkins had 2 high schools, Robbinsdale had 3 high schools, White Bear Lake had 2 high schools, and Roseville had 2 high schools. Golden Valley used to have their own high school. Did I forget any?

Go Gophers !!!!!!!!!
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For all the flak Eden Prairie has taken over the past few years of dominance, that's been their reasoning for not building another high school. The district is basically built up at this point, and they expect declining enrollment over the next 20 years or so. Running multiple high schools is expensive and they claim they'd rather not have to re-consolidate in 20 years like the schools you mention. I expect that Elk River is going to regret going from one to three high schools (ER, Rogers and Zimmerman), especially since growth in the exurbs has ground to a halt with the mortgage crisis.

The district I'm really surprised that still has two high schools is Mounds View/Irondale.
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
There are still some good football players who were originally from Park Center, they just rarely go to Park Center HS.
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We just moved out of the Park Center district a year ago. I think a lot of the kids there either go to Champlin Park (though I've heard that CP is closed to open enrollment due to capacity issues) or they just go to private schools like Totino-Grace.
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
That's not true. They just go to different schools who have better football programs. Some of the most successful football programs in the state are chock-full of inner city / 1st ring suburb kids. They attend schools with better football programs. A significant portion of our state's best football players are from these areas.

You see them stay in their home school more (but not always) for basketball more because you only need a couple kids to turn around a program. It's the nature of the sport.

Every single year, there is a lot of talent from these areas. Occasionally, those athletes stay at their school. However, even if they stay, they aren't good enough to allow those programs to beat the big boys (Gjere, Hageman, Rucker) or they attend private schools (Henderson, Floyd, Onwualu).
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Who are you talking about? Cretin and DeLaSalle are taking a few kids, but they haven't been on the same level with the Lake Conference. Watch last year's semifinal between Cretin and Wayzata. If you've seen Elite level high school football in the suburbs in the past 10 years you would know that the stars are not inner city kids open enrolling to the suburbs. That may be true for basketball but not for football. There certainly are transfers on the teams, but since they didn't grow up in the youth program, they don't usually contribute much.
 


Richfield, St. Paul, Columbia Heights, and Brooklyn Park are represented on the Gopher roster. Funny none of them played for their public school. These kids migrate to better academic and football schools if they can.
 

discochris said:
For all the flak Eden Prairie has taken over the past few years of dominance, that's been their reasoning for not building another high school. The district is basically built up at this point, and they expect declining enrollment over the next 20 years or so. Running multiple high schools is expensive and they claim they'd rather not have to re-consolidate in 20 years like the schools you mention. I expect that Elk River is going to regret going from one to three high schools (ER, Rogers and Zimmerman), especially since growth in the exurbs has ground to a halt with the mortgage crisis.

The district I'm really surprised that still has two high schools is Mounds View/Irondale.
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Elk River may be regretting adding high schools for an entirely different reason: they have to listen to the Rogers camp not wanting to subsidize the parts of the district not in the RHS catchment area.

As for the original splitout, they had to do something. You have to remember that from 1990 until the mid-2000s, the city councils of the area approved anything that didn't bite them first. I remember reading minutes about an ER City Council meeting where an official from the district practically begged for a residential development moratorium, so they had a chance to build up their schools to meet the demand. Later in the same meeting, final approval was given for a 200-unit tract development.

Even with Rogers and Zimmerman split out, class sizes at ERHS are about the same as they are when my cousin graduated from there in 1995. Right now the combined enrollments of the three District 728 high schools (ER, Rogers, and Zimmerman) are 3,277. Put those in one building, and that school would be nearly 10% bigger than either Wayzata or Eden Prairie, and nearly a third bigger than anyone else in the Northwest Suburban (Blaine and Champlin Park both have around 2,500 students).

The enrollments the MSHSL uses for class groupings can be found here: http://www.mshsl.org/mshsl/enrollments.asp?sort=2
 


AO54 said:
Who are you talking about? Cretin and DeLaSalle are taking a few kids, but they haven't been on the same level with the Lake Conference. Watch last year's semifinal between Cretin and Wayzata. If you've seen Elite level high school football in the suburbs in the past 10 years you would know that the stars are not inner city kids open enrolling to the suburbs. That may be true for basketball but not for football. There certainly are transfers on the teams, but since they didn't grow up in the youth program, they don't usually contribute much.
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First, Cretin won the state championship in 2009, their best teams can compete with the Lake Conference.
Second, the schools that are full of kids from those areas (CDH, St. Thomas, Totino Grace (beat EP and Wayzata this year), Holy Angels, De La Salle)
Third, many of those kids stay at their non-dominant school (Brookins, Rucker)

Lastly. . .
I wasn't saying that those schools are as good as the powerful Lake Conference schools, I am saying that a ton of the talent from the State of MN are from Minneapolis, Saint Paul and those First Tier suburbs without dominant football programs. Their TEAMS aren't as good as Wayzata or EP, but their is a ton of talent coming from those areas and there always has been. It's not about the youth in those areas not playing, it's about their programs. It's pretty easy to see.

Here is a quick list of players who grew up Mpls/Saint Paul/First Tier suburban.
Seantrel Henderson, Michael Floyd, Anthony Hayes, Isaac Hayes, Malik Rucker, Keelon Brookins, Larry Fitzgerald, Joe Mauer, Rashon Powers-Neal, Ryan Harris, Kim Royston, Hageman, Jeff Jones, James Onwualu, Jimmy Gjere and a good portion of the best players in the state every single year. It's a fact, a good portion of the best payers in the state every single year, grew up playing youth football in Minneapolis, Saint Paul or one of those First Tier Suburbs who didn't have a dominant HS program.

As far as basketball? They contribute a TON.
Hopkins is constantly getting ripped on for being full of kids who did not grow up in their youth program. Some of the parents move to the district, but Hopkins talent is not soley a result of their youth program.

Basketball is largely the reason why the MSHL installed the rule forcing kids who transfer to sit out a season.
 



MaxyJR1 said:
Richfield, St. Paul, Columbia Heights, and Brooklyn Park are represented on the Gopher roster. Funny none of them played for their public school. These kids migrate to better academic and football schools if they can.
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And recent Gophers are also from those areas:
Kim Royston (I think he's from Brooklyn Park)
Shady Salamon - He's from SSP (I think also grew up in Saint Paul)
Jimmy Gjere - Irondale
 

The point wasn't that there are no good football players in the city, the point was their teams are terrible (comparatively), because the kids are more into basketball. This is not the case everywhere in the country. The difference between St. Paul Johnson's competitiveness in Basketball vs. Football is not just a result of the larger number of players needed to play football.
 

The original point of my contentionwas the slamming of Bloomington programs and how they're inferior to their peers.

They, undoubtedly are, but it has little to do with how the program is run or their coaches! The points and debate through this thread have clearly explained how much of an uphill battle schools like them are facing!
 

AO54 said:
The point wasn't that there are no good football players in the city, the point was their teams are terrible (comparatively), because the kids are more into basketball. This is not the case everywhere in the country. The difference between St. Paul Johnson's competitiveness in Basketball vs. Football is not just a result of the larger number of players needed to play football.
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You're stating a conclusion that we both agree upon (Johnson is more competitive in basketball than football) and using that as a reason to prove your point. You're point was that in the inner city and first tier suburbs the kids prefer basketball to football and that is why the football programs suffer.

We all agree the football programs aren't good, so pointing out that Johnson can't compete with EP is beside the point.

There aren't just some good football players from the city (and first tier suburbs), there is a significant portion of the best players in the state every single year from these areas. They aren't choosing basketball over football at any higher rate, they are simply going to other schools (or not being able to compete with the best of the best while being at their home school).
 



OddStack said:
The original point of my contentionwas the slamming of Bloomington programs and how they're inferior to their peers.

They, undoubtedly are, but it has little to do with how the program is run or their coaches! The points and debate through this thread have clearly explained how much of an uphill battle schools like them are facing!
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Kennedy has been terrible for years, but Jefferson used to be a major athletic powerhouse.

Bloomington is becoming demographically similar to Richfield and St. Louis Park, Fridley, Spring Lake Park etc. All of which used to be considered big schools.

Not speaking to income so much, but rather that the population has aged and so there are fewer kids to fill teams. I think you're going to see this in Minnetonka too over the next ten years. I'm actually surprised that it hasn't affected Edina the way it has SLP since Edina is a older school as well. You won't see it in Hopkins and Wayzata because those districts are so geographically huge.
 

discochris said:
Kennedy has been terrible for years, but Jefferson used to be a major athletic powerhouse.

Bloomington is becoming demographically similar to Richfield and St. Louis Park, Fridley, Spring Lake Park etc. All of which used to be considered big schools.

Not speaking to income so much, but rather that the population has aged and so there are fewer kids to fill teams. I think you're going to see this in Minnetonka too over the next ten years. I'm actually surprised that it hasn't affected Edina the way it has SLP since Edina is a older school as well. You won't see it in Hopkins and Wayzata because those districts are so geographically huge.
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I was speaking of demographics when I was pointing out the initial reasons. Economics only came into it when I mentioned 1st ring suburbs (non-Edina) and low income housing leading to transient populations to defend the Bloomington programs.

Kennedy wanted to go to a different conf. more than a decade ago, but the Admin in B'town didn't want to split the two schools up like Cooper and Armstrong had done. People on the West side of B'town are now seeing the light as they are starting to the same issue but less magnified than Kennedy's.
 

AO54 said:
Keep in those enrollments are the adjusted enrollment figures, not actual. The MSHSL thinks kids with poor parents are terrible athletes, so they only count them as 60% of a normal student.
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I'm well aware that those are adjusted numbers.
 

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