I was looking on the KHSAA at the State Final Rosters and saw that Danville had an enrollment of 556 students. Upon further research I found out that Raceland has an enrollment of 303, Paintsville has 253, and Paris has 200. Is this proof that a change was needed in the classification of schools? Other than 4A, what other classes would have to play schools double their size in the same class to win a state championship? For example if Paintsville were to play Danville in the State Championship you would have a school with an enrollment of 253 kids playing a school with 556 kids. That's more than double of Paintsville's enrollment.

 

In 4A, I know there are schools with 1100 students playing schools with

1800-2000 students.

 

I think this suggests that there was a "real" need to change/modify the classifications of 1A and 4A schools.

Great post. They need to look further into the class system.

On a side note, I found out that Ohio is looking at restructuring their classes and enrollment limits based on the enrollment differences of some Division 1 schools in Ohio. They are not adding classes, but are restructuring how they classify each school into a class based on enrollment numbers.

Read my previous posts. I stated that it only happens in 1A and 4A. I did in fact mention it happens in 4A in some of my earlier posts.

I was just trying to reiderate the point that there was too large of a variance at both ends. The people who are upset by the changes are largely the ones that were on the upper end of the variance.

I was just trying to reiderate the point that there was too large of a variance at both ends. The people who are upset by the changes are largely the ones that were on the upper end of the variance.

 

Very true. I just think that in this day in age of "EQUALITY", you shouldn't ask two classes (1A and 4A) to play schools "TWICE" their size to win a state championship in the SAME class, when it doesn't happen in the other two classes (2A and 3A).

 

Going back to my original statement, I think this was the reason or "proof" that a change of some sort was needed and is why we are going to 6 classes next year.

Very true. I just think that in this day in age of "EQUALITY", you shouldn't ask two classes (1A and 4A) to play schools "TWICE" their size to win a state championship in the SAME class, when it doesn't happen in the other two classes (2A and 3A).

 

Going back to my original statement, I think this was the reason or "proof" that a change of some sort was needed and is why we are going to 6 classes next year.

I agree. It is easy to say that it is tradition, not numbers, when you have been under a situation that has the male enrollment doubled vs. every team you play outside of your area. It was time for this change. I totally agree with your point.

Could you elaborate a bit. I do not believe I understand your concept. Are you saying Team A has an advantage over Team B because of proximate population? Would this concept include the number of schools within a population boundary?

There are several counties in the state with multiple school districts that play football.

 

The following numbers are based on 2005 population estimates and include only the schools that currently field a varsity program.

 

When you take the population of a county and divide by the number of football-playing schools, you get 12 that average 20,000 or more per school.

 

Fayette - 38,297

Boone - 35,424

Laurel - 28,169

Jefferson - 25,919

Madison - 25,916

Warren - 24,740

Christian - 23,381

Hopkins - 23,352

Daviess - 23,265

Bullitt - 22,824

Jessamine - 21,731

Barren - 20,036

 

Of those 12, only Fayette, Jefferson, Madison, Christian, Daviess, and Barren County have schools of the A or AA size in them. Fort Campbell is included in Christian County.

 

So to use the examples I gave and if you average out the number of residents per school in each county, Beechwood (17,073), Lexington Christian (38,297), and NCC (14,451) have more kids to draw from than Crittenden County (8,984), Pineville (12,000), and Russellville (13,584).

The bottom line is this: No matter how many classes you put in, its not going to make everyone happy. I did think that schools like X, Male and Trinity belonged in a different class than schools like Iroquois, Butler, Bullitt Central, etc. These schools will hardly ever have a chance if they have to play those bigger teams on a regular basis.

 

I still say one of the best scenarios you could have that would elminate all this playoff talk with teams going 0-10 is this:

Develop a Bowl System. Have the top 2 teams in each district play in the playoffs and then for the rest of the schools...take the average number of wins by all schools and determine a "magic" win number. If you say the magic number is "6 wins" then all teams that went 6-4 will go to a bowl game, with that game pairing two similar teams with similar records that have not played each other. After that game, the season is over, done finished. Winner gets a bowl trophy, both teams get t-shirts and can split the gate.

If a team goes 6-4 but is the 1 or 2 seed in their district, then the 3rd place team goes to the bowl in their place regardless of record.

 

If that happened, I think a team like Butler would rather face another similar opponent in a bowl game rather than have to face a Male or St. X in the first round of the playoff with little or no chance to win. Not picking on Butler...but just using that as an example

There are several counties in the state with multiple school districts that play football.

 

The following numbers are based on 2005 population estimates and include only the schools that currently field a varsity program.

 

When you take the population of a county and divide by the number of football-playing schools, you get 12 that average 20,000 or more per school.

 

Fayette - 38,297

Boone - 35,424

Laurel - 28,169

Jefferson - 25,919

Madison - 25,916

Warren - 24,740

Christian - 23,381

Hopkins - 23,352

Daviess - 23,265

Bullitt - 22,824

Jessamine - 21,731

Barren - 20,036

 

Of those 12, only Fayette, Jefferson, Madison, Christian, Daviess, and Barren County have schools of the A or AA size in them. Fort Campbell is included in Christian County.

 

So to use the examples I gave and if you average out the number of residents per school in each county, Beechwood (17,073), Lexington Christian (38,297), and NCC (14,451) have more kids to draw from than Crittenden County (8,984), Pineville (12,000), and Russellville (13,584).

 

This could be a little misleading in that you cant really say that you can draw from that many people. Im not sure how it works around the state, but in Jefferson Co, the guidelines that are used for "racial" equality prevent some schools from even being able to draw from that "pool" of numbers. Jefferson Co schools (except parochial schools & Traditional schools) are only allowed to get students from within their own district as set by the Board of Education. Gone are the days of drawing from your neighborhood, but rather "assigned districts". So that doesnt really mean that Jefferson Co schools can draw from a larger pool of students, but rather only from who the Board says you can draw from. Otherwise, a school like Iroquois would have had players that now go to Central, Western, Butler, Doss, etc.

In Boyle County you can no longer go to Danville if you live outside of the city limits, and vice versa. If you live in BC you go to BCHS, and if you live in the city limits you go to school at DHS. There are no choices for students and parents any longer. I think this is a shame. Mainly for academic reasons. However, I know the reason it was implemented began when BCHS began having success on the football field, and DHS began losing quality students and athletes to the better funded County School System. They had to do it to hang on to their dwindling enrollment.

 

PS I would rather see a single class system than a 6 class system. Even if we only had a chance to win it once every 20 years (and don't think we wouldn't have been in the mix at some point in the past 20 years).

They had to do it to hang on to their dwindling enrollment.

 

While I agree whole-heartedly with your point, I didn't think Danville's enrollment was ever dwindling.

It was. Trust me. I happened to be very well connected to the executive staff of the school systems when this happened, and I understand why all of that went down the way it did.

Both numbers came off the KHSAA website, so if it was a poor example you can blame the KHSAA for that. Look at Danville's roster for the 2006 state final game online at KHSAA.org and you will see that on the roster page it clearly states that Danville's enrollment is 556 students. Then if you go and click on the district alignments and cutoffs for each class link, you will clearly see that Class A is supposed to be 0-531 Students. I think this in itself clearly backs up the argument I was trying to make in my previous posts that some Class A schools HAVE to play other Class A schools that are twice their size to win a state championship. Something that doesn't happen in 2A or 3A.

 

If it was a poor example Sandman, then you can blame the KHSAA for the confusion, not me.

 

I'm not laying blame anywhere, and specifically none toward you. In fact, I say nice job with the research.

 

My questions now become, why is Danville playing in class A if their enrollment is 556 and the cutoff is 531? Were they on their way to class AA next year (a lag in the system perhaps?). If it was a lag in the system, why? No consolidation of schools in the area (as happened with Mercer County). Did anyone notice this and get a response from the KHSAA?

 

Again, this isn't meant as a slam to Danville. They're playing where they were classified to play.

 

Of course, the easy answer is one class football.

The KHSAA used to re-classify every two years, then changed to a four-year cycle, making adjustments only in cases where a school's enrollment varied by a certain percentage ... so there may have been more examples of schools' fluctuating enrollment moving them above or below a class line.

 

In the old four-class system, Danville was on the verge of being bumped up to 2A.

The bottom line is this: No matter how many classes you put in, its not going to make everyone happy. I did think that schools like X, Male and Trinity belonged in a different class than schools like Iroquois, Butler, Bullitt Central, etc. These schools will hardly ever have a chance if they have to play those bigger teams on a regular basis.

 

I still say one of the best scenarios you could have that would elminate all this playoff talk with teams going 0-10 is this:

Develop a Bowl System. Have the top 2 teams in each district play in the playoffs and then for the rest of the schools...take the average number of wins by all schools and determine a "magic" win number. If you say the magic number is "6 wins" then all teams that went 6-4 will go to a bowl game, with that game pairing two similar teams with similar records that have not played each other. After that game, the season is over, done finished. Winner gets a bowl trophy, both teams get t-shirts and can split the gate.

If a team goes 6-4 but is the 1 or 2 seed in their district, then the 3rd place team goes to the bowl in their place regardless of record.

 

If that happened, I think a team like Butler would rather face another similar opponent in a bowl game rather than have to face a Male or St. X in the first round of the playoff with little or no chance to win. Not picking on Butler...but just using that as an example

 

 

Believe it or not this was such a system in the late 70's in Central Kentucky. Many schools used to belong to The Central Kentucky Conference. It was not based on size but Central KY schools that wanted to pay and be in it. Schools such as: Danville, Boyle, Henry Clay, Woodford Co., Frankfort, Harrodsburg, Mercer, and I even think Somerset was part of it.

 

In those days only one team per district went to the playoffs. That left a lot of good teams still out there. The CKC would invite the best of those squads to play in a Bowl game the week after the regular season ended. Boyle played in the game twice. In 1976 a 9-2 Boyle team faced Henry Clay and beat the Devils 28-27. (Big win for the Rebel program then) In 1978 the two played again with a 6-4 Rebel squad getting beat 30-10 by a 10-1 Henry Clay team that was pretty good. :lol:

 

The old CKC bowl died after the '79 season when Frankfort was invited to play Danville. (At Boyle we were 9-1 and devestated at missing the playoffs. So our coaches said they weren't going to play in another meaningless Bowl game.)