It was another weekend of crowning state champions down at Lucas Oil Stadium – and with it came the never-ending social media debate on public schools vs. private schools.
Certain trends remained constant – with three public and three private winning state titles. The three private schools were in the three smallest classes, further igniting the conversation that something, ANYTHING has to be done to offset the dominance that private schools have displayed in Classes 1A through 3A.
Some stats:
- A private school has won Class 1A five straight years.
- A private school has won Class 2A three straight years.
- A private school has won Class 3A four of the last five years.
The trend continues the further back in time you go, with public school coaches crying foul at the “unfairness” of it all.
So how do you make it “fair?” Does anything even need changed?
Blitz is of the opinion that, when it comes to adding a private-only class, that’s a slippery slope. Since the inception of Class 6A a decade ago, just four programs – Warren Central, Ben Davis, Carmel and Center Grove – have won state titles. Should that group be put into a special Class 7A because it is unfair to the other schools in 6A?
What about rural vs. urban schools? Take Fort Wayne, for example. So many folks want to use the lazy argument of the “recruiting” that private schools do. It’s a laughable concept when you consider the amount of it that goes on throughout the city limits – public AND private. There is a lot more player movement and transfers within a metropolitan area than in the sticks because there are more options.
So should we have a movement where metro schools and rural schools are in different classes? They do play by different rules in terms of talent pool and ease of movement, after all.
What’s the apex of classes? We have six now. Add a private-only class you have seven. Add 7A you have eight. Split urban and rural and you have nine.
See? It gets silly pretty fast.
To be clear, Blitz is not against a private-only class for Classes 1A through 3A. But it’s not an end-all solution. Perhaps instead of looking at how we assign teams to each class, we look at how we count students at schools in each class.
A Facebook post over the weekend by Hoosier Prep Gridiron detailed an idea of using a multiplier – counting a student as two for each private school instead of one. It would push privates up a class outside of Success Factor. Locally, it would make Bishop Dwenger 5A, Bishop Luers and Concordia Lutheran 4A and Blackhawk Christian 2A.
It definitely has potential.
Another idea comes out of Georgia, with the GHSA using a 3x model. Beginning in 2021, private AND public schools had students outside of their school zones (or feeders) count as three students. This was to combat programs that have an influx of athletes from other areas surrounding them. Private schools are allowed to choose their “attendance zone” within reason. For instance, Bishop Dwenger and Bishop Luers would draw their zones to reflect their natural feeders across the city. Concordia could claim the entirety of the city as its zone as the only Lutheran school.
It’s not perfect, but it signifies progress to some.
An amendment to that rule is coming for the next two-year cycle in Georgia, with schools not having to apply the 3x multiplier to out-of-zone students if they began inside the zone in the fifth grade or earlier.
It is an interesting proposition because it addresses two big issues – private vs. public and the propensity of talent to gravitate towards one program within a certain area or school district.
Of course, open enrollment in Fort Wayne Community Schools for students entering high school is much an antithesis towards encouraging kids to stay within their school zone.
Blitz doesn’t feel as if something HAS to be done. Then again, he isn’t a public school coach seeing prime opportunities for a state title end at the hands of a private school year after year (looking at you Coach Michael Mosser).
Are there solutions? Yes.
Is there a perfect solution? Probably not.
Will the debate ever end? Not anytime soon.
These opinions represent those of Blitz and Outside the Huddle. No opinions expressed on Outside the Huddle represent those of any of our advertisers. Follow Blitz on Twitter at Blitz_OTH
It appears Adam Central had twice as many players as Lutheran….Lutheran should be moved up to 3A because they have a more talented QB and faster kids….where is the compensation for the last 20yrs where they never even won a sectional before this run of success, oh wait we don’t talk about that…..it’s like saying hey build your program and if you succeed we will punish you…
I don’t know about Lutheran, but AC’s team was composed of Varsity and JV. I heard someone say that Lutheran had recruited 1 of their players from as far as Nebraska. Anyone able to verify this?
As far as the proposed solution, it could help and is an interesting idea to consider!
A team like Vincennes Lincoln has to play all Evansville schools which is very unfair because as we know most of them have really good football teams so they have kids move from one school to another for whatever the reason may be makes it hard for Vincennes to have much of a chance and not just football all other sports as well just look at Vincennes football record as well as the other teams in the conference by the way Vincennes is a 3A school
Using “Hoosier Prep Gridiron” as anything resembling a credible source is a fool’s errand. The guy who runs it has been kicked out of every forum/website he’s ever been part of because he’s a grifter who throws stuff against a wall and sees what sticks.
The success factor was adopted because it applied equally to all IHSAA schools. Because of this Lutheran, Bishop Luers and Bishop Chatard from the non public group and Adam’s Central, East Central and Fort Wayne Snider from the public group will all move up a class for the next two years. That the way it’s supposed to work. Does recruiting occur? Absolutely! Top athletes are identified through club, travel, AAU and other for profit out of season (IHSAA) programs. Those athletes hear from public, non-public and out of state prep schools on a regular basis. Having spent time as a non public school principal and having represented non public schools on the IHSAA Board of Directors, I can assure you these things were regularly discussed. Now with college transfers easy and NIL money so readily available on the college level (unfortunately soon to trickle down to the high school level), there is little that school administrators and the IHSAA can do to fight that.