With a few huge red zone stops last Friday, Bishop Luers was able to hold off North Side 10-8 in the wind and rain to claim its fifth-consecutive victory.
It also kept the Knights atop the SAC Small School Division with a 3-0 record. Only a date with South Side in Week 8 is between Luers and its second division championship in two years.
It’s not surprising. When Outside the Huddle broke the news in January of 2022 that changes were coming to the SAC, it was clear to those who examined the divisions that a program that had to be ecstatic was Bishop Luers. Not only was it going to get a pair of non-conference weeks to schedule up, it was also the most consistent winning program in the five-team small division, joined by North Side, South Side, Concordia Lutheran and Wayne.
What did that mean? Well, it means that while other perennial SAC contenders like Snider, Homestead, Carroll and Bishop Dwenger all have to play each other to decide the Big Division, Bishop Luers only has to take on a quartet of programs that it is a combined 35-9 against over the last decade to capture the Small Division crown.
So the question is, is it fair?
Now this column isn’t meant to take anything away from Bishop Luers. It is actually calling attention to how good it is, in fact.
Since the adoption of the division format, Bishop Luers has yet to lose to a team in its division. There have been some good games – North Side and Wayne have given the Knights fits each of the last two years – but the end result each time has been a Knights win.
We knew this was going to be an issue. In the Northeast Corner Conference, there are Big and Small Divisions just like the SAC. However, there is no conference champion, merely a pair of division champions. The thought being, how can you properly crown a champion when the divisions are unbalanced?
Yet we are trying to do it in the SAC. The Victory Bell is an important piece of hardware awarded to the team that wins the conference each year. Because of that, it is imperative if, at all possible, the league crowns one champion.
In Year 1 of the new division format, we couldn’t. Bishop Luers and Snider were the division champions, but did not play each other in the regular season, meaning the two shared the SAC championship.
Currently, Bishop Luers and Carroll are the division leaders. The two do not play this season, meaning we could have another tie for the title.
The SAC wants to have its cake and eat it too. Blitz is a huge fan of what the league has done to open up non-conference opportunities, but the divisions make no sense. They are lopsided and uneven, yet the team that beats supposed inferior foes has just as good of a shot to win the conference title as the one that has to run the gauntlet in the Big Division.
The dominance displayed by Bishop Luers so far has been impressive, but it has also been expected. It is a perennial power that is matched up with four other programs that struggle to put together consecutive winning seasons. Inevitably, a Wayne or North Side is going to make a run and capture that division, but more often than not, Bishop Luers is going to reign supreme.
The question is, is the SAC fine with the imbalance? And what could be done to rectify it? Even out the division fields? Scrap the divisions altogether?
Time will tell. In the meantime, Bishop Luers will enjoy where it sits, the program with the easiest path to an SAC crown year after year.
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
Be the first to comment