^^^

 

Just to form a baseline here, and with curiosity, ehre are some hypotheticals I would like to get your take on.

 

Let's assume you are a new Head Coach and each school below has offered you the job and carte blanche to overhaul their program. You get complete authority from Grade 12 to the Pop Warner program.. which position do you take in each instance and why. I would like to see answers from both Tusi and Ram... in fact as I type this I am going to create a new thread...

My big argument against enrollment being much of a factor is, just because you have 1400 boys does not guarantee you one single "elite athlete". The total number of students in the school does not necessarily equate to a larger number of quality players. Conversely, a school that has 200 players could have 25 "elite" athletes. There is no promise that if you have more boys you will have better football players.

 

Now, if there was a rule that you had to have one "elite" football player in your school for every 100 male students, I would be on the "bigger" is better bandwagon.

 

I still content, the more players you have that are able to "play" give you a much better chance of winning football games then does the number of students a school has.

 

And statistically speaking the greater the population to pull from, the greater the chance of having talent that can then be molded into those players able to play the game. There is a much better chance at having 5 250lb lineman out of a population of 1400 than there is out of a population of 200. What the program does with those 250lb lineman is a whole different conversation.

 

Is it an absolute? No. There are obviously exceptions to the statistics. But without knowing anything else I'll take that 1400 school every time to beat the 200 school and I would be right many more times than not.

http://bluegrasspreps.com/ky-football-high/hypothetical%3B-you-become-306252.html

 

Here you go..would love to see everyone weigh in to see what each person's outlook is on what breeds great programs when all other things are equal

And statistically speaking the greater the population to pull from, the greater the chance of having talent that can then be molded into those players able to play the game. There is a much better chance at having 5 250lb lineman out of a population of 1400 than there is out of a population of 200. What the program does with those 250lb lineman is a whole different conversation.

 

Is it an absolute? No. There are obviously exceptions to the statistics. But without knowing anything else I'll take that 1400 school every time to beat the 200 school and I would be right many more times than not.

The law of averages would be on your side :thumb:

Trinity & Highlands have played only two games. In 1969 Trinity won 20-7 at Highlands. On 19-Aug-2000 Highlands greeted Bob Beatty in his first-ever game as Trinity coach with a 42-29 smackdown at Montgomery County. While that’s only a 13-pt margin, I have heard Coach Beatty say a couple times that those 13 points do not tell the tale: Highlands dominated Trinity. While a regular season series would be a lot of fun, the two schools decided to go with 4-quarter exhibition games in 2010 & 2011 then 3-quarter + multiple scrimmage setups from 2012 to 2014. You better believe both teams played at game speed. In my view the 2010 game that Trinity won 49-42 was the classic, with Trinity holding off the surging Birds at the end; I have no way to prove that this exhibition game was the best game in KY that year, but I would like to know a better one. Trinity “won” all 5 of the three/four-qtr exhibitions. A lot more to be said about this thrilling series. But this year Highlands scrimmages Cincinnati St. X while Trinity scrimmages Henry Clay.

Responses after each statement

My thought on platooning is this: look at the schools in Kentucky that platoon. Are the majority of the schools successful and somewhat successful, or are they all just terrible?

GREEN GUY: “I think the key to having a competitive program at any level is the degree that the head coach sets strict guidelines on everything & enforces them. If the coach controls the team, does not tolerate academic or behavioral lapses or a rowdy locker room, guarantees nobody anything they can’t earn in practice, & assembles a quality staff, look for good results and happy fans.”

It's is definitely more difficult to platoon at a smaller school, no doubt, but that doesn't mean it isn't the factor that can make an average program become an elite program.

GG: “That makes numerical logic but who amongst has not seen a big squad with lots of quality players NOT platoon? One ex-coach in Louisville probably cost his school 2 state titles in the last 13 years by playing his best players, even the QB, both ways, when there were at least another 12 players he could groom. His two potential championship teams lost both of the playoff games in the fourth quarter to less-talented but smarter-coached teams that let as many talented kids as possible play in one setting or another (kickoffs, extra-point team, punt receiving team, etc.). I speak vaguely because these are interpretations & the coach did win 2 or 3 titles with his non-platoon system. On the other side, one prominent coach with a big squad trains players to play 2 or 3 O/D positions & may have up to 5 or more going both ways. Conditioning is the key here, I feel.”

There are many factors that play into how a program becomes elite, but looking at what makes the elite programs elite, what would you say that makes them elite? Money?

GG: “Money? I am not sure what you mean? We have few rich schools in this state.” Kids? Talent pool? Platooning?

Male enrollment has nothing to do with the eliteness of an athletic program.

GG: “Indeed. But the number of popular sports available in each season does. For various reasons a multi-talented student may play only one or two sports: the student needs to spend more time on academics than that darn guy who plays 3 sports, is student body prez, & maintains a high GPA in an honors program; the student’s family may not be able to afford the equipment in multiple sports; the student may like to divide time between a sport & community service; the student needs to work to get his spending money; the student may be banged up from one sport. But go back to the available popular sports. Say a school has 1300 males with the choice of 12 KHSAA sports & 6 or more club sports. Also realize a student may concentrate on the sport that gives him the best chance of a college scholarship even if it may not be a local glamour sport.”

I hesitate about some of the criteria: "Contribution outside of W's & L's are factored in. Head Coach prestige, D-1 players, NFL players, & competing on the Regional or National level all are factors." The D-1 & NFL thing really bothers me. How many kids with D-1 talent are happy just playing for the high school and town but then moving on? I know a dozen right off in the last 15 years just from 1 team (& that includes coach-announcers saying this kid has to have a lot of majors after him). I think we all do. They want to play for their school & that's it. Plus, and this is a big one, a great h/s athlete simply may not grow physically to compete at higher levels. How many of us were pretty good but peaked at 18? I see a few hands out there in the audience.

 

Re competing against region and/or national powers, I feel queasy about this one too. (1) Location may work against you. We have enough trouble in Kentucky with a team having to spend 4-5 hrs on a school bus for a playoff game … then another 4-5 home. And I repeat – a school bus, noisy, rough-riding, lousy seats/back support, no seat belts, bad ventilation … (2) The school may not have enough of a budget and/or booster support to pull it off. (3) A good team may be from a poor area & is lucky to have uniforms & a halfway decent field & flimsy stands. We are talking about high school athletics. It’s really cool to go play a well-known team but some competitive teams simply might not have the respect, resources, & wherewithal.

 

So the criteria automatically exclude some worthy teams, don’t they?

 

I would say keep it to highly competitive W-L records in regular season & playoffs as well as the standing of the head coach. But that standing ought to be based on a real foundation, like being a true role model whom the guys love, then imaginative practices, game planning, & mid-game adjustments, not to mention O & D styles, & maybe most important, building a good team around the players’ talents as well as turning a bunch of not-so-talented players into wild & crazy overachievers.

^^^^

 

I know you mean well.... but Huh??????

 

I think you are looking at this a little different than it is intended.

 

This is simply a fun thread to distinguish which programs in Kentucky basically identify the state to the other parts of the country and areas surrounding.

 

Pikeville may have a great program, great kids, lack the budget to play National opponents, and a respected coach... but if you ask someone from Knoxville Tennessee to identify the programs they think of when they think of KY HS Football Pikeville will never get listed. Instead they are going to name the teams who win titles, plays Ensworth and Brentwood, produces the guys they see play on Saturday, and the teams they see appear in National Rankings.

 

I am as big of a Belfry fan as you will find and the Pirates check a lot of boxes for the criteria of this thread and the things you mentioned, but I would not say they are nearly as iconic as some of the teams on this list.

For longitudinal records 2003-14, click calpreps.com & scroll down to end for the 2 DYNASTY links. You get plenty of tables: for the US, for KY, & for any other state. You also want to go to the High School Football dynasty compilation here: De La Salle leads Dynasty Compilation - NationalHSFootball.com But it doesn't help us much: the compilation is national. Of the 500 teams, there are only 4 KY representatives: #20 Trinity; #135 Highlands, #154 St. Xavier, #356 Bowling Green.

 

But the calpreps link is loaded with stuff: columns for every team in KY including its W-L record, district W-L, class W-L, KY W-L, W-L against top-1000 teams, W-L against top 7000 teams, & the W-L records of opponents. Plus each team's power rating & schedule strength rating. PR & SoS are averages over the 2003-14 span but the W-L records are aggregates of those 14 years. You of course can sort KY teams into the 6 classes & other things.

 

What I did with the material is compute W%'s for all the W-L columns. If anybody is interested, I could either attach my calculations to a post here, if that can be done, or send it as an email attachment to a person who asked via BGP private mail. It's a mass of data anyway you shake it.

^^^^

 

I know you mean well.... but Huh??????

 

I think you are looking at this a little different than it is intended.

 

This is simply a fun thread to distinguish which programs in Kentucky basically identify the state to the other parts of the country and areas surrounding.

 

Pikeville may have a great program, great kids, lack the budget to play National opponents, and a respected coach... but if you ask someone from Knoxville Tennessee to identify the programs they think of when they think of KY HS Football Pikeville will never get listed. Instead they are going to name the teams who win titles, plays Ensworth and Brentwood, produces the guys they see play on Saturday, and the teams they see appear in National Rankings.

 

I am as big of a Belfry fan as you will find and the Pirates check a lot of boxes for the criteria of this thread and the things you mentioned, but I would not say they are nearly as iconic as some of the teams on this list.

You started the thread, your criteria, but your criteria only validates your list in your mind, not some of the other people making comments on here.

Does Boyle County belong over Danville?

 

Should Mayfield be in over Beechwood? Should Mayfield even be in the Top 5 at all?

Should mayfield be in the top 5? Surely your being sarcastic.

That is the way people, in Kentucky, rationalize the success of Highlands and Trinity. Everyone thinks Trinity wins because they have more students, the fact is, Trinity wins because many of the best football players in Louisville that want to play for Trinity, because Trinity has dedicated themselves to success. It wouldn't matter if Trinity had 200 students or 2000 students, with their success many of the better players want to play there.

 

The same can be said for Highlands, Highlands is smaller, so it must be their youth program. What about the community that makes it the program that it is? The only rational explanation of their success must be their youth program. How else could people explain them being smaller but still being so successful?

 

Everyone wants a magic recipe for success, and if they can't achieve that, they blame it on being small, or not having the "talent pool".

 

Just by virtue of having more students in the school does not automatically translate to finding more successful, gifted, driven athletes.

 

How about the large 6A programs that don't win all the time? They have so many students to draw from.

 

The real answer is, the school, the program, and the community have to make football a priority, and drive for success. If they do that, they will have more players, if they have more players they can platoon and wear other teams down.

 

This might be the smartest thing ever posted on the Internet.

This might be the smartest thing ever posted on the Internet.

Thanks Jason, I've preached the sermon for years. But, it mostly falls on deaf ears.

Hard to not put Male up there. Iconic in the Louisville area for sure and each decade seems to contend. Going all the way back to the 1880s...

 

Recent National Select 7on7 championship and current national ranking should help their case.

Based on the opening statement that introduced this thread: "For Today's installment we will define the Top 5 Football Programs that personify Kentucky to the rest of the HS Football world," from the perspective of someone who grew up in 'the rest of the HS Football world'...the most iconic programs would be Trinity, Highlands, St. X, and Male. After that, there would be a large gap before any other teams would come to mind.

 

I know there are other programs that are currently, and even historically, very, very strong. However, in terms of regional & national perception, it's those 4.