On of the oldest rivalries in the 16th region looks like it won't happen this season.

After dropping Raceland from their football schedule, now Russell drops Ashland from their basketball schedule per Zack Klemme.

Russell joins other 16th region schools West Carter and Lewis Co. in dropping the Tomcats off their schedule.

 

Parents and kids run away from Russell. 

Parents and kids aren't going to Run away from Russell over Dropping Ashland. While I don't agree agree with dropping the games, there is no love lost with Russell and Ashland anyway. Russell is still the place to go if you want your kids to have  the best public school education in NEKY plus have good sports. Russell isn't going anywhere. It's supposed to Student before athlete anyway.

Not scheduling a top team in your region  is NOT the way to address issues you may have with a school.

To be the Best you have to beat the Best.

Wow I thought Ashland was losing Porter who’s entering college early plus senior graduation this would be a bit of rebuilding year for Ashland. I’ve not been home long enough to hear if there’s something going on at Ashland that’s getting swept under the rug or not. Replacing Porter is some big shoes to fill so I would expect this will be a up and down year but be ready come district and regionals. 

8 hours ago, Falcon Pride said:

Not scheduling a top team in your region  is NOT the way to address issues you may have with a school.

To be the Best you have to beat the Best.

You can always beat them in the regional.

Better chance of beating them in a Regional if you play them (win or lose) during the regular season.

i'd always want to know how I match up…

Have any players defected from Russell to Ashland?  That could be a potential reason behind the scheduling.

I say good for Russell and Lewis County.  Mason County isn’t playing GRC for the same reasons.  

I think everyone in the area knows why teams are dropping Ashland.  It has nothing to do with fear of a beatdown.  It's more than that.  I say good for Russell and the others.  

18 minutes ago, spindoc said:

I think everyone in the area knows why teams are dropping Ashland.  It has nothing to do with fear of a beatdown.  It's more than that.  I say good for Russell and the others.  

So tell us, some of us don't live in the area.

I am going to drop this in here just in case:

4. No recruiting comments or allegations of KHSAA rules violations by any school, coach, player or booster are allowed. No comments about where any player lives, has lived, or where they are from in a recruiting context. This is not the place to report KHSAA violations. Feel free to contact Kentucky High School Athletic Association | KHSAA – Student-athletes of Today, Leaders of Tomorrow to report such violations, but do not discuss violations here.

5 hours ago, 4 Quarters said:

So tell us, some of us don't live in the area.

I think this hour long phone call sums it up.  https://10thregion.com/2022/06/21/listen-ashlands-jason-mays-recorded-in-recruiting-phone-call-with-boyd-county-parent-and-player/

Where did the referenced kid end up? 

This seems to be happening more and more across the state, and I have mixed feelings. 

"Be the best, beat the best" yeah I see a lot of truth to that and the competitor in me wants to see teams face all challengers.  However, it is up to the schools to decide what is best for their program and if they feel not playing certain schools for whatever reason is their best course of action, well that is up to them.  

Sometimes publicly doing something like this brings light to the alleged problem.  It is happening in NKY as well with CovCath and teams not playing them.