Mike Fields - Lexington Herald Leader

 

A bunch of familiar faces will gather in Louisville next weekend for the state football finals. Nine of the 12 schools that will play at Papa John’s Cardinal Stadium already own championship trophies: Trinity has a state-record 17, Highlands 16, St. Xavier 11 and Beechwood 9. The rest of the former champs and their number of titles: Fort Campbell (3), Newport Central Catholic (3), Belfry (2), Bowling Green (1) and Lexington Catholic (1).

 

The newcomers to the Big Show will be Central, Lexington Christian Academy and Lone Oak.

 

Lone Oak is without a doubt the biggest surprise. Once a dormant (or doormat) program in Paducah, the Purple Flash have fashioned a 14-0 record thanks to a quarterback who has shattered the national record for TD passes in a season. Corey Robinson completed 32 of 54 passes for 484 yards and 4 TDs lin a 38-35 win over Warren East last night. That pushes his totals to a state-record 5,610 yards and a national-record 90 TDs. Lone Oak trailed Warren East 35-28 with less than 5 minutes left, but Robinson threw a TD pass to tie it, and the Purple Flash won it on freshman Jack Coorts’ 18-yard field goal with 5 seconds left.

 

Lone Oak will take on Lexington Catholilc next Saturday afternoon in the 4A finals.

 

The least surprising results from last night’s semifinals included Trinity’s 56-21 win over Boone County, St. X’s 31-3 rout of Meade County, and Highlands’ 49-21 romp over Lincoln County.

 

NewCath ran its post-season streak to 14 victories in a row by beating DeSales 31-3, and will go for a third consecutive state title. Coach Bob Schneider, the state’s all-time winning coach, will be seeking his fourth state title and 325th career win in his 43rd year with the Thoroughbreds.

 

http://fieldsnotes.wordpress.com/

The new 6 division alignment has mixed results:

 

The finals pairings have mixed results concerning repeat appearances.

School Wins Appearances

Beechwood 10 13

Lexington Christian 0 0

NCC 3 7

Ft Campbell 3 4

Belfry 2 5

Central 0 0

Lone Oak 0 0

LexCath 1 1

Highlands 16 21

Bowling Green 1 4

St. X 11 14

Trinity 17 21

From Cincy Enquirer columnist Ryan Ernst:

 

Competitive balance ...

 

I'm working on a column about this, but I thought it was interesting enough to blog as well. The KHSAA switched from four football classes to six classes in the offseason in an attempt to make things more competitive within the classes. While teams are now competing in the playoffs against schools closer to their own size, things have actually become less competitive.

 

At this point in the playoffs, the average margin of victory has risen from 21.5 points per game in 2006 to 26.3 points per game in 2007. The average margin of victory in the state quarterfinals and semifinals has risen from 18.5 points per game to 22.8 points per game.

 

Here's a look at how everything breaks down by class:

 

2006

Class -- Avg. playoff margin -- Avg. QF and SF margin

Class 1A -- 21.7 -- 19

Class 2A -- 25.1 -- 22.7

Class 3A -- 20.3 -- 14.8

Class 4A -- 19 -- 17.5

Totals -- 21.5 -- 18.5

 

2007

Class -- Avg. playoff margin -- Avg. QF and SF margin

Class 1A -- 27.4 -- 30.2

Class 2A -- 26.9 -- 17.3

Class 3A -- 25.2 -- 16.7

Class 4A - - 28.5 -- 18.8

Class 5A -- 25.8 -- 20.5

Class 6A -- 23.8 -- 33

Total -- 26.3 -- 22.8

Very interesting CS.