Kentucky Country Day 2018

What does Kentucky Country Day need to do to improve in 2018? What do they need to keep doing to be successful? Remember, please be constructive.

This team appears to have been hit hard with graduation. What do they have returning?

Has the QB from last year officially transferred to another school yet?

Has the QB from last year officially transferred to another school yet?

I believe he was a senior.

I believe he was a senior.

Yes, Jackson Diaz was their QB and he was a senior.

Kentucky Country Day was the best 1A team that I saw last year besides Beechwood. They had a really good core group of players. Almost all of them were seniors. There was a running back that was a junior that impressed me. This will be a major rebuilding year for them.

KCD graduated 13 seniors. They are headed to places like Air Force, Pomona, University of Chicago, MIT, Wabash all to play football at the next level. Very difficult to replace that kind of leadership and talent. KCD returns a very good running back in Blake Caldwell, some up and coming receivers with size and speed....but is gonna be hard pressed on the front line in 2018. And as mentioned, All Conference and All District QB Jackson Diaz graduated. The 1A Player of the Year, RB Ashton Robinson graduates too. And All Metro, All State and Multiple All Star Selection TE Josh Lifson leaves to play for the Air Force. Coach Matt Jones who was 1A coach of the year has a ton to replace...very capable dude, but this is a big task.

Coach Matt Jones who was 1A coach of the year has a ton to replace...very capable dude, but this is a big task.

What kind of feeder system is there for a school like KCD? Is there a middle school program? Do the kids all come from the same place or from different schools?

KCD is a K-12 school, so they have the opportunity to get to the kids early. Flag Football starts, I believe in 3rd and 4th. 5th and 6th historically combined for the first year of full contact and then 7/8 combined as well. KCD gets a few kids from the Catholic Middle Schools, but it's not as steady a stream as it could be.

The message to a good Catholic Middle School kid should be pretty simple....if you don't believe you can start more than a year at Trinity or St X, why wouldn't you come to KCD and play multiple sports and start multiple years playing football. The education is the best in the state, and Josh Lifson proved this year that if you have the goods, KCD kids can play D1. The other kids like Robinson and Diaz and All District Lineman Robert Thomas help make the case that a good football player at a top academic HS can enhance his chances of being accepted to the most competitive academic schools in the country. That's the pitch I'd make. What makes it hard is that Catholic High School in Louisville is less expensive than KCD.