On 10/11/2025 at 11:07 AM, longballers said:

I will give you that they are a bigger school but twice the size is incorrect. Cov Cath has about 500 and Elder has 800. Highlands has about a 1,000 so I assume 1/2 boys?  This post is an excuse post with people trying to cope with the fact that Ohio just has better football teams. Highlands, Cov Cath, Trinity, and St X all have good teams but just not to the level of Southwest Ohio GCL. I mean doesn’t Louisville St X and Trinity each have about 1,200 students??  Maybe Elder and Moeller should have to combine to play them….lol. 

Not entirely correct with #’s. Elder has closer to 900 boys, which is actually a low enrollment for them from what I’m told. HHS has an approximately 450 or less boys. So , twice as big and does a great job of getting kids to go there and become great student athletes. HHS does the same with its program. I’ve been saying for years, that if HHS played the Wyomings, Indian Hills, Madeira, etc. that would be in their class/size range, we would run the table on those teams most years. It’s all #’s and athletes when it comes to playing up in class by several classes no matter what state your in.

57 minutes ago, cricketbird said:

Not entirely correct with #’s. Elder has closer to 900 boys, which is actually a low enrollment for them from what I’m told. HHS has an approximately 450 or less boys. So , twice as big and does a great job of getting kids to go there and become great student athletes. HHS does the same with its program. I’ve been saying for years, that if HHS played the Wyomings, Indian Hills, Madeira, etc. that would be in their class/size range, we would run the table on those teams most years. It’s all #’s and athletes when it comes to playing up in class by several classes no matter what state your in.

The KHSAA 2024-2025 Audited School Enrollment file show Highlands with 506 boys. 

It’s splitting hairs on the numbers game. We can all agree that whatever Division Highlands would be put in, in Ohio, they would still be very successful. The issue would be just the sheer amount of schools that were in the same Division, so even the run with Dale Mueller may not have brought as many titles or title game appearances. But they would be in the top 10 of that division way more often than not.

Pretty sure CovCath and Highlands would be Division II in Ohio.

5 minutes ago, colonel-fan said:

Pretty sure CovCath and Highlands would be Division II in Ohio.

Correct. Ohio Division 2 enrollment numbers 378-591. Anything 592+ would be division 1. 

 

6 hours ago, cricketbird said:

Not entirely correct with #’s. Elder has closer to 900 boys, which is actually a low enrollment for them from what I’m told. HHS has an approximately 450 or less boys. So , twice as big and does a great job of getting kids to go there and become great student athletes. HHS does the same with its program. I’ve been saying for years, that if HHS played the Wyomings, Indian Hills, Madeira, etc. that would be in their class/size range, we would run the table on those teams most years. It’s all #’s and athletes when it comes to playing up in class by several classes no matter what state your in.

I can't agree more on this. Perfectly put.

6 hours ago, Breds82 said:

It’s splitting hairs on the numbers game. We can all agree that whatever Division Highlands would be put in, in Ohio, they would still be very successful. The issue would be just the sheer amount of schools that were in the same Division, so even the run with Dale Mueller may not have brought as many titles or title game appearances. But they would be in the top 10 of that division way more often than not.

I agree.  Ohio has 706 schools playing football and KY has 222.  Lot more competition to go thru in OH.  Population of Ft Thomas is approx 16,600.  Elder draws from 4 zip codes.  Still glad we play and I expect it's a teaching moment.

On 10/12/2025 at 3:37 PM, CoachMulvi said:

Correct. Ohio Division 2 enrollment numbers 378-591. Anything 592+ would be division 1. 

 

The caveat is that's grades 9-11 numbers in Ohio.  Not sure if KY counts the same way for athletic purposes. 

22 minutes ago, New Colonel said:

The caveat is that's grades 9-11 numbers in Ohio.  Not sure if KY counts the same way for athletic purposes. 

Looks like you are correct @New Colonel.  And I am not saying this opinion of mine is right everyone but I was thinking there is no way Highlands or CovCath would be D2 in Ohio, more like D3.  Anywho, from Google AI:

For the 2025-2026 school year, the Ohio High School Athletic Association (OHSAA) uses the male enrollment numbers for grades 9-11 from the October 2023 count to determine football divisions. These numbers are then adjusted using a "competitive balance" formula to finalize a school's division. The enrollment ranges for each OHSAA football division in 2025-2026 are:

Division I: 706 and over
Division II: 424 to 705
Division III: 288 to 423
Division IV: 192 to 287
Division V: 144 to 191
Division VI: 98 to 143
Division VII: 97 and under 

On 10/13/2025 at 4:02 PM, theguru said:

Looks like you are correct @New Colonel.  And I am not saying this opinion of mine is right everyone but I was thinking there is no way Highlands or CovCath would be D2 in Ohio, more like D3.  Anywho, from Google AI:

For the 2025-2026 school year, the Ohio High School Athletic Association (OHSAA) uses the male enrollment numbers for grades 9-11 from the October 2023 count to determine football divisions. These numbers are then adjusted using a "competitive balance" formula to finalize a school's division. The enrollment ranges for each OHSAA football division in 2025-2026 are:

Division I: 706 and over
Division II: 424 to 705
Division III: 288 to 423
Division IV: 192 to 287
Division V: 144 to 191
Division VI: 98 to 143
Division VII: 97 and under 

KHSAA obtains official enrollment figures from the Kentucky Department of Education (KDE) for boys in grades 9–12.

Ohio uses 9 - 11.

Why would Ohio only do 9-11?

29 minutes ago, Breds82 said:

Why would Ohio only do 9-11?

I guess so they don't have to rely on the past or speculate about the future.  In other words, real numbers. 

I’ll take that and raise you this. Why doesn’t kentucky do the same? I’d assume population numbers but I really have no clue and just genuinely curious.

18 hours ago, theguru said:

I guess so they don't have to rely on the past or speculate about the future.  In other words, real numbers. 

Yes.  Because its from the two years prior to the current season (October 2023), using 9-11 ensures that the classes competing when they are frosh and jv are most accurately accounted for at the Varsity level as Juniors and Seniors.  It also takes out factoring in an abnormally large or small Senior class that would have been gone for two years by the time the players who were freshman during the original count are now on varsity.