Not sure but they did make the 2nd round of the 4a playoffs last year. However, they ended up in the North bracket and had to play Montini in Week 11.
They were in the South bracket in '24 when they upset Rochester,
New housing w/in the district boundaries exploded during the early 1990s but fizzled out for the most part by 2010.
Lots of people w/children, like me, moved in during the boom period but most of those kids have now graduated. Enrollment peaked around 2021-22 and has fallen every year since...
Montini, Rochester, Morris, and SHG all have an impressive number of returners.
Mt Zion, Carterville, and Breese were hit hard by graduation, although Breese returns their now Jr QB who played great against Rochester.
Would the reason be that a single Decatur HS would be by far the largest enrollment in the CS8 (possibly 7A) or the difficulty in then having to "recruit" another school to come in to keep the conference at 12 teams?
Looking at that list, Rochester has only ever faced one of those schools in the regular season, Peoria in 2023.
This year the non-conference opponents are Moline and Batavia. Last year it was Gibson Southern (IN) and Mt Zion. In '24, it was Simeon and Cardinal Ritter.
I would like to see in...
Taylorville HS enrollment has decreased from 1,019 in 2005 to 662 currently.
I would think THS would jump at the opportunity to add students through consolidation.
Any idea why it's not happening? Usually, the resistance to consolidation comes from the smaller school(s).
This would seem on...
Heartland. Larry Bird at Indiana State.
One Shot at Forever. Small school makes an improbable run in 1971 IL state baseball tourney.
The Last Folk Hero. Bo Jackson at Auburn, the NFL, and MLB.
That was a crazy risk that paid off.
He had a play against the Rockets that still sticks with me. Blitzed on a 3rd and long, Rochelle back pedaled at least 15-20 yards behind the line of scrimmage, avoided multiple sack chances, finally decided to run when a gap opened in the middle, and ended...
Former Titan Coach David Hay will be on the staff of the Red team in the upcoming June 20th Shrine game at Illinois Wesleyan. Former CS8 players who will be on the Red team are DE Connor Broughton (Rochester), DB Chezno Cottone (U High), LB Tate McCue (Chatham), and OL Zach Poole (Lincoln).
Former Springfield High QB Rashad Rochelle, who played first at Rutgers and then at Indiana State as a WR, has been invited to participate in the Carolina Panthers rookie minicamp.
Rochester's days of flirting with 5A enrollment classification are gone. After years of being near the top of the 4A playoff schools in enrollment, Rochester was 21st out of the 32 4A playoff qualifiers last year with 682 students. If current trends hold up, they could be as low as 600 students...