IHSA competitive balance committee minutes

Cross Bones · Mar 26, 2026

ramblinman reborn said:
I've toyed with this over the years. Each time, I come up with something different.

The big unknown is always who is in the NIPL to begin with. Is it some private schools or all of them? Are non-boundaried public schools in or out?

For the sake of discussion, let's agree that it's private only and it's all of them. In a scenario like that, there are roughly 50 football playing private schools, so you can't have more than 3 classes of 8-team brackets in order to make it so that roughly 50% of schools qualify. That's why I like the concept of a 10-game regular season so that everyone gets that extra game and only the top half who qualify get to play up to three more playoff games.

How to qualify and classify those 24 teams into three classes is something where enrollment will need to be taken into consideration, but it wouldn't be the sole factor. You know me...I want to balance playoff classes as much as possible so that the 8 most competitive teams are in the top class. I don't want a situation where people could say that a team in one class was so good that they could have won the class above. I also want to try to avoid a situation where the least competitive teams in the top two classes would lose by first round blowout in the class immediately below it.

Qualification, classification, and seeding are unknowns at this point. I'd love to see a system that incorporates SOS and coaches' input in some way, and I think that's more easily accomplished with 50 football playing schools than with ten times that number. I know you don't like this, but I'm not against some sort of success factor. I'm against it in its current format within the IHSA because it discriminates between non-boundaried and boundaried schools. I'd be open to it in a NIPL context if it applied to all schools. Regular season record and enrollment are factors that ought to be heavily weighted relative to other factors.

The above is limited to an athletic association of private schools only. If you add all non-boundaried football playing public schools to that mix, there would be increased flexibility to expand the number of classes and/or the number of qualifiers in each class.

Im somewhat jealous of what an opportunity this would actually be for private schools to have the best possible playoff bracket. Like you I would prefer classes based on competitive level which I think is possible here because they're already in conferences with each other for the most part so we already know.

I would hope that public counterparts would be more open to non-con games so the playoff wouldn't just be a repeat of the regular season though. Thats one of the things I wouldnt like about a split.

Anon622286 · Mar 26, 2026

ramblinman reborn said:
I've toyed with this over the years. Each time, I come up with something different.

The big unknown is always who is in the NIPL to begin with. Is it some private schools or all of them? Are non-boundaried public schools in or out?

For the sake of discussion, let's agree that it's private only and it's all of them. In a scenario like that, there are roughly 50 football playing private schools, so you can't have more than 3 classes of 8-team brackets in order to make it so that roughly 50% of schools qualify. That's why I like the concept of a 10-game regular season so that everyone gets that extra game and only the top half who qualify get to play up to three more playoff games.

How to qualify and classify those 24 teams into three classes is something where enrollment will need to be taken into consideration, but it wouldn't be the sole factor. You know me...I want to balance playoff classes as much as possible so that the 8 most competitive teams are in the top class. I don't want a situation where people could say that a team in one class was so good that they could have won the class above. I also want to try to avoid a situation where the least competitive teams in the top two classes would lose by first round blowout in the class immediately below it.

Qualification, classification, and seeding are unknowns at this point. I'd love to see a system that incorporates SOS and coaches' input in some way, and I think that's more easily accomplished with 50 football playing schools than with ten times that number. I know you don't like this, but I'm not against some sort of success factor. I'm against it in its current format within the IHSA because it discriminates between non-boundaried and boundaried schools. I'd be open to it in a NIPL context if it applied to all schools. Regular season record and enrollment are factors that ought to be heavily weighted relative to other factors.

The above is limited to an athletic association of private schools only. If you add all non-boundaried football playing public schools to that mix, there would be increased flexibility to expand the number of classes and/or the number of qualifiers in each class.

I'm surprised you want a 3 class system for only 50 schools. Seems pretty watered down to give 3 state championship trophies across 50 schools.

ramblinman reborn · Mar 26, 2026

Anon622286 said:
I'm surprised you want a 3 class system for only 50 schools. Seems pretty watered down to give 3 state championship trophies across 50 schools.

It may not be ideal, but it is realistic given the situation. The only other options are one or two classes. The competitive and enrollment gulfs between the smallest and least competitive private schools and the largest and most competitive are just too wide for anything less than three classes, in my opinion.

JCHillmen10 · Mar 26, 2026

Anon622286 said:
I'm surprised you want a 3 class system for only 50 schools. Seems pretty watered down to give 3 state championship trophies across 50 schools.

That would be the million dollar question. 3 does seem like a lot for that number of teams. but 2 is just too small for the small distribution of real competitive teams. Two classes would leave enrollments well into the 1000s likely squaring off against enrollments in the 400s in a playoff system, which seems quite a stretch.

Ideally, the CPS and CCL could get together as non boundaried and create a canvas of 100-150 football playing schools to distribute into classes. Most CPS schools could join up with Leo and Ottawa Marquette type schools in a 1A. Morgan Park, Simeon, etc could join into a 2A or 3A with more competitive Catholic schools.

If it is just 50 private schools, both 2 classes and 3 classes are entirely insufficient for providing a meaningful playoff, but would still lean toward 3 being much better than 2.

ramblinman reborn · Mar 26, 2026

Cross Bones said:
I would hope that public counterparts would be more open to non-con games so the playoff wouldn't just be a repeat of the regular season though. Thats one of the things I wouldnt like about a split.

I would hope the same. In a post-split environment, the ability for private and public schools to play each other in regular season non-conference OR conference games would be critical. The non-Chicago area private schools like SHG, PND, BCC, QND, etc. that are already in conferences with public schools would be hard pressed to schedule regular season games without public school cooperation (and IHSA approval) in that regard. Same with private schools that play an independent schedule like Althoff, Mater Dei, St. Teresa, Walther Christian, etc.

If the IHSA prohibits public schools from playing private schools in a post-split IHSA, those private schools not in conferences that play independent schedules and those private schools that had previously been in conferences with public schools will be hugely challenged to find in-state opponents to fill their regular season schedules. In that case, it might become common for private schools to play each other more than once per regular season. It happens in other high school sports like hoops, lacrosse, and baseball, and it may have to happen in high school football.

Travelin Fan · Mar 26, 2026

Th

ramblinman reborn said:
I would hope the same. In a post-split environment, the ability for private and public schools to play each other in regular season non-conference OR conference games would be critical. The non-Chicago area private schools like SHG, PND, BCC, QND, etc. that are already in conferences with public schools would be hard pressed to schedule regular season games without public school cooperation (and IHSA approval) in that regard. Same with private schools that play an independent schedule like Althoff, Mater Dei, St. Teresa, Walther Christian, etc.

If the IHSA prohibits public schools from playing private schools in a post-split IHSA, those private schools not in conferences that play independent schedules and those private schools that had previously been in conferences with public schools will be hugely challenged to find in-state opponents to fill their regular season schedules. In that case, it might become common for private schools to play each other more than once per regular season. It happens in other high school sports like hoops, lacrosse, and baseball, and it may have to happen in high school football.

Think you’re right and I think you’d also see a rise in neutral sight games splitting the travel burden.

To one of your earlier points about “Montana and Alaska”, as a long since aged out athlete from a small population/large land mass area - yep…just drive. We had multiple conference opponents 2 hours away.

LWN_Pheonix · Mar 26, 2026

I am going to be honest here

I would have bet my entire life savings that this thread could not hit 3 pages without edgy deleting it

either Edgy has gotten soft on his trigger finger, or we have matured as a message board

akz68 · Mar 26, 2026

ramblinman reborn said:
I've toyed with this over the years. Each time, I come up with something different.

The big unknown is always who is in the NIPL to begin with. Is it some private schools or all of them? Are non-boundaried public schools in or out?

For the sake of discussion, let's agree that it's private only and it's all of them. In a scenario like that, there are roughly 50 football playing private schools, so you can't have more than 3 classes of 8-team brackets in order to make it so that roughly 50% of schools qualify. That's why I like the concept of a 10-game regular season so that everyone gets that extra game and only the top half who qualify get to play up to three more playoff games.

How to qualify and classify those 24 teams into three classes is something where enrollment will need to be taken into consideration, but it wouldn't be the sole factor. You know me...I want to balance playoff classes as much as possible so that the 8 most competitive teams are in the top class. I don't want a situation where people could say that a team in one class was so good that they could have won the class above. I also want to try to avoid a situation where the least competitive teams in the top two classes would lose by first round blowout in the class immediately below it.

Qualification, classification, and seeding are unknowns at this point. I'd love to see a system that incorporates SOS and coaches' input in some way, and I think that's more easily accomplished with 50 football playing schools than with ten times that number. I know you don't like this, but I'm not against some sort of success factor. I'm against it in its current format within the IHSA because it discriminates between non-boundaried and boundaried schools. I'd be open to it in a NIPL context if it applied to all schools. Regular season record and enrollment are factors that ought to be heavily weighted relative to other factors.

The above is limited to an athletic association of private schools only. If you add all non-boundaried football playing public schools to that mix, there would be increased flexibility to expand the number of classes and/or the number of qualifiers in each class.

Last time I checked, there are now 16 public schools getting a bye in each class during Week 10 due to the expanded playoff schedule setup. What about doing 9 games for both public and private and making Week 10 an open invite bowl like set-up for those 128 public schools and the 48 playoff qualifiers as privates for some outstanding public vs. private matchups and for bragging rights?

And then run the separate public and private playoffs from there.

I admit this is an unrealistic pipe dream, but this post made me think of how it could potentially take advantage of the new expanded playoff system.

Honestly I’m just thinking I’d love to see East St. Louis call out the #1 seed in the private playoffs to say let’s do this Week 10.

4Afan · Mar 26, 2026

akz68 said:
Last time I checked, there are now 16 public schools getting a bye in each class during Week 10 due to the expanded playoff schedule setup. What about doing 9 games for both public and private and making Week 10 an open invite bowl like set-up for those 128 public schools and the 48 playoff qualifiers as privates for some outstanding public vs. private matchups and for bragging rights?

And then run the separate public and private playoffs from there.

I admit this is an unrealistic pipe dream, but this post made me think of how it could potentially take advantage of the new expanded playoff system.

Honestly I’m just thinking I’d love to see East St. Louis call out the #1 seed in the private playoffs to say let’s do this Week 10.

Except no team would pass up a bye and risk injury going into the playoffs.

Anon622286 · Mar 27, 2026

ramblinman reborn said:
It may not be ideal, but it is realistic given the situation. The only other options are one or two classes. The competitive and enrollment gulfs between the smallest and least competitive private schools and the largest and most competitive are just too wide for anything less than three classes, in my opinion.

Why don't they just work harder and get better?

ramblinman reborn · Mar 27, 2026

Travelin Fan said:
Th

Think you’re right and I think you’d also see a rise in neutral sight games splitting the travel burden.

To one of your earlier points about “Montana and Alaska”, as a long since aged out athlete from a small population/large land mass area - yep…just drive. We had multiple conference opponents 2 hours away.

I would imagine your conference may also have had a relatively large discrepancy in terms of enrollments because, to some degree, beggars can't be choosers. Sometimes, a game is a game, and it can't always be a perfect fit.

Although some parts of Illinois are fairly unpopulated relative to the rest of the state, it's nothing in comparison to much larger states with much smaller populations. Wyoming, which is about 40% larger than Illinois in terms of square miles, has roughly 144 public and private schools containing grades 9-12. Heck, there are 127 private high schools in the IHSA alone.

A possible variable here are the 147 private high schools in Illinois that don't belong to the IHSA. Could some or most of them be enticed to join a private school athletic association? Most are small with small athletic programs, but that's fine. The more private schools in the association, the greater the opportunities with respect to scheduling, post season play, etc.

The more I think of it, the more I think that a statewide private school athletic association could work in Illinois. Only a relative handful of private schools would be adversely affected by long travel times in the regular season. Adding some/most of the private schools that don't currently belong to the IHSA could only serve to lessen that burden.

ramblinman reborn · Mar 27, 2026

Anon622286 said:
Why don't they just work harder and get better?

I've never asked public schools to work harder and get better to win anything other than playoff games or titles in their own classes with similarly sized schools, but you knew that and asked the question anyway because you probably thought it was clever. Instead, it was a specious question because it was asked with an underlying false premise.

Colin2299 · Mar 27, 2026

ramblinman reborn said:
I would imagine your conference may also have had a relatively large discrepancy in terms of enrollments because, to some degree, beggars can't be choosers. Sometimes, a game is a game, and it can't always be a perfect fit.

Although some parts of Illinois are fairly unpopulated relative to the rest of the state, it's nothing in comparison to much larger states with much smaller populations. Wyoming, which is about 40% larger than Illinois in terms of square miles, has roughly 144 public and private schools containing grades 9-12. Heck, there are 127 private high schools in the IHSA alone.

A possible variable here are the 147 private high schools in Illinois that don't belong to the IHSA. Could some or most of them be enticed to join a private school athletic association? Most are small with small athletic programs, but that's fine. The more private schools in the association, the greater the opportunities with respect to scheduling, post season play, etc.

The more I think of it, the more I think that a statewide private school athletic association could work in Illinois. Only a relative handful of private schools would be adversely affected by long travel times in the regular season. Adding some/most of the private schools that don't currently belong to the IHSA could only serve to lessen that burden.

What’s your take on Newman Catholic, SHG, BCC? Would they come or stay in the IHSA?

johnndoe · Mar 27, 2026

So if 3 classes of non-boundary championships would occur, 48 of the 50 schools qualify and must win 4 games for a title. Will the boundary side of the tournament also face 4 games for the top spot? How many classes of 16 teams must exist for this equity to be achieved? Will the same percentage of boundary schools be denied playoff qualification like the 4% who sit out on the other side? Should these above conditions even need to be exactly the same?

cornerrat#1 · Mar 27, 2026

Colin2299 said:
What’s your take on Newman Catholic, SHG, BCC? Would they come or stay in the IHSA?

All..... Can't read the mind of the SHG administration but I do know they would look at this strictly as a financial and revenue math problem. If revenue can be maintained and appear to have a possibility of increasing with an all private league then they would go to alumni and fans and get their input.

I have mentioned this though for years. What happens if the IHSA says if you make the jump in football the other sports have to go as well. They could blow it up. Then travel expenses when you include all the other sports would be really prohibitive. And included in the scenario very late nights for kids who have games during the week. Would the Ihsa be that crazy and lose even more money by doing just that. Who knows.... Ratsy

ramblinman reborn · Mar 27, 2026

Colin2299 said:
What’s your take on Newman Catholic, SHG, BCC? Would they come or stay in the IHSA?

I honestly don't know. I have no take. I do think, though, that the early involvement by non-Chicago area private schools would help entice similar schools to join. If the schools you mentioned plus others like QND, Althoff, Alleman, etc. see this as a Chicago area association, they will be understandibly hesitant to join.

More than anything, what needs to happen is a good plan communicated effectively. These private schools are not accustomed to talking with each other outside of their conferences. They just don't. A solution to that problem needs to be found from the very beginning or the idea will not take off.

For this concept to get air under its wings and get off the ground, private schools need to be educated and convinced that leaving would help them in the long run and that staying would be the status quo or worse.

ramblinman reborn · Mar 27, 2026

johnndoe said:
So if 3 classes of non-boundary championships would occur, 48 of the 50 schools qualify and must win 4 games for a title.

You misread my hypothetical NIPL playoffs. It would be three classes of 8-team brackets resulting in 24 qualifiers, not 48. Three games to win a title, not four.

johnndoe said:
Will the boundary side of the tournament also face 4 games for the top spot? How many classes of 16 teams must exist for this equity to be achieved? Will the same percentage of boundary schools be denied playoff qualification like the 4% who sit out on the other side? Should these above conditions even need to be exactly the same?

Honestly, if the privates and publics split, the boundaried public schools can do whatever they want. A split is a split. The NIPL would not be within the IHSA.

Now, the IHSA may want something different. They may want to keep the private schools and manage the two different championship divisions, but I wouldn't want the public school-dominated IHSA to govern private school championships. That's the fox guarding the henhouse as far as I am concerned.

Kevin JCHS 1981 · Mar 27, 2026

ramblinman reborn said:
I've never asked public schools to work harder and get better to win anything other than playoff games or titles in their own classes with similarly sized schools, but you knew that and asked the question anyway because you probably thought it was clever. Instead, it was a specious question because it was asked with an underlying false premise.

specious? Good Word

Travelin Fan · Mar 28, 2026

@ramblinman reborn ,

Would be curious on your view of the now two year old rejected proposal from the Sangamo. It replaced the multiplier by setting the school’s enrollment to the average enrollment of all public/boundary high schools that are above that school's enrollment and within a 30-mile radius.

It never got past the committee which I guess I was surprised by, but I have a decidedly central Illinois bias/point of view. Is this basically the population density argument you were discussing previously? By my quick math at the time SHG would’ve been a 5A and QND a 4 I believe. I didn’t do any calculating up north but I imagine it wouldn’t be well received because so many Chicago area privates would end up in the same class, which I guess would be 7a or 8a.

cornerrat#1 · Mar 29, 2026

All.... There have been several proposals out of the Sangamo leading the "charge" for the conference by district AD Eucker. I believe the one you have referenced several years ago was #13. Recently another one he submitted for the conference came out if I recall correctly #14 in 2024 which would increase the multipler from 1.65 to 2.5. Like those from the past it never made it far enough down the line for membership to vote on. I'm sure more are coming...... Ratsy

ramblinman reborn · Tuesday at 11:39 AM

Travelin Fan said:
@ramblinman reborn ,

Would be curious on your view of the now two year old rejected proposal from the Sangamo. It replaced the multiplier by setting the school’s enrollment to the average enrollment of all public/boundary high schools that are above that school's enrollment and within a 30-mile radius.

Like most proposals to "even the playing field," it employs a hammer to address a situation that calls for a tweezers. It is also not well thought out.

Take a private school like SHG, for example. If you take all the boundaried public schools in a 30-mile radius from SHG in Springfield, what would the average enrollment of those schools be? Would it be larger or smaller than SHG's enrollment of 550? If larger, would it be large enough to bump SHG up to a higher class? If larger but not large enough, then SHG stays where it is. Hell, it might even be smaller!

Now look at a private school like Beacon Academy, a Montessori high school with 152 students in Evanston. What do you think the average enrollment is of boundaried public schools within a 30-mile radius of Beacon Academy in downtown Evanston? My guess is that it would be well over 1000. Does Beacon Academy really need to be playing first round playoff games in a 3A boys and girls basketball class with schools of between roughly 1,000 and 1,500 students?

Proposals like the one you mentioned coming from rural conferences rarely look beyond their necks of the woods. As such, it is ridiculously easy to demonstrate how provincial and unreasonable they truly are...which is why they seldom get past the committee stage to be voted on by the board.

FootballDad1979 · Tuesday at 2:55 PM

Colin2299 said:
We can argue all day about the specifics of this. All I'm saying, is if the privates separated from the IHSA, it is my opinion, that you would see more kids that would traditionally go public school end up at private schools because private schools would not be bound to the IHSA's scholarship rules.

You dont think the NIPL would have scholarship policies in place?

ramblinman reborn · Tuesday at 3:02 PM

cornerrat#1 said:
All.... There have been several proposals out of the Sangamo leading the "charge" for the conference by district AD Eucker. I believe the one you have referenced several years ago was #13. Recently another one he submitted for the conference came out if I recall correctly #14 in 2024 which would increase the multipler from 1.65 to 2.5. Like those from the past it never made it far enough down the line for membership to vote on. I'm sure more are coming...... Ratsy

That 31-point spanking at the hands of ICCP in the 2022 3A title game is still stinging his butt. Disregard the fact that loss to ICCP is their ONLY football playoff loss to a private school since 1995, you know it's sticking in his craw for sure. The ridiculous proposals serve to make him look good in front of his school community that had their title hopes destroyed by a big bad private school from up north. It's their way of trying to make lemonade out of lemons. If they can't stick it to the private school on the playing field, they are going to try their hardest to stick it to all private schools through IHSA legislative means.

FootballDad1979 · Tuesday at 3:08 PM

If the goal is to create a more balanced and competitive postseason field, we should take a closer look at how sectionals are structured.

A common concern from public schools is the frequency of all-private matchups in the later rounds—particularly in semifinals and finals. If private schools represent roughly 25% of IHSA membership, it raises a fair question: should their representation in the final rounds more closely reflect that percentage?

One potential solution would be to adjust sectional or super-sectional placement so that private schools are more evenly distributed—or in some cases, grouped within the same pathway (e.g., quadrant in football). This could help prevent disproportionate clustering in later rounds while still maintaining competitive integrity.

It’s also important to note that non-boundary schools, while sometimes discussed alongside private schools, are still public institutions and should be treated as such within any classification model (with appropriate adjustments where necessary).

ramblinman reborn · Tuesday at 4:00 PM

FootballDad1979 said:
If the goal is to create a more balanced and competitive postseason field, we should take a closer look at how sectionals are structured.

A common concern from public schools is the frequency of all-private matchups in the later rounds—particularly in semifinals and finals. If private schools represent roughly 25% of IHSA membership, it raises a fair question: should their representation in the final rounds more closely reflect that percentage?

A "fair question" to whom? Trust me, public schools wouldn't share that "common concern" if they hadn't already gotten bounced by private schools in the earlier rounds. What you are suggesting is not only highly discriminatory, but it opens the door to other public schools to have "concerns" about their inability to beat:

Wealthy schools
Urban schools
Northern schools
Schools with "township" in their names

FootballDad1979 said:
One potential solution would be to adjust sectional or super-sectional placement so that private schools are more evenly distributed—or in some cases, grouped within the same pathway (e.g., quadrant in football). This could help prevent disproportionate clustering in later rounds while still maintaining competitive integrity.

But only in those sports where private schools dominate, right? LOL

Or is it your intention to put the screws to the private schools in all sports? Gotta make sure those pesky private schools with their "private school advantage" don't crack the top 12 in the boys and girls bowling state final tournaments! After all, private schools don't represent more than 1/12th of the overall bowling field so you gotta protect those top 12 public schools, right?

FootballDad1979 said:
It’s also important to note that non-boundary schools, while sometimes discussed alongside private schools, are still public institutions and should be treated as such within any classification model (with appropriate adjustments where necessary).

What does "treated as such" mean? With kid gloves?

cornerrat#1 · Wednesday at 9:34 AM

ramblinman reborn said:
That 31-point spanking at the hands of ICCP in the 2022 3A title game is still stinging his butt. Disregard the fact that loss to ICCP is their ONLY football playoff loss to a private school since 1995, you know it's sticking in his craw for sure. The ridiculous proposals serve to make him look good in front of his school community that had their title hopes destroyed by a big bad private school from up north. It's their way of trying to make lemonade out of lemons. If they can't stick it to the private school on the playing field, they are going to try their hardest to stick it to all private schools through IHSA legislative means.

All.... And a quick search of the current 10 teams in the Sangamo show their all time postseason play record against the privates at 17 wins and 19 losses. Almost 50 -50 (some better then others) but the public school hand-wringing continues. Ratsy

Swansa01 · Wednesday at 10:30 AM

Travelin Fan said:
Th

Think you’re right and I think you’d also see a rise in neutral sight games splitting the travel burden.

To one of your earlier points about “Montana and Alaska”, as a long since aged out athlete from a small population/large land mass area - yep…just drive. We had multiple conference opponents 2 hours away.

Sometimes lots of driving. Though Montana scheduling is easier than one would think as most Classes break down evenly. We have a 9 week season to play a minimum of 8 games. Some schools choose to take a bye, some choose to schedule a game depending on their situation. I coach in Class A (second biggest class, but most schools have 350-450 kids). Our conference has 6 teams, the closest one is 12 minutes away, the furthest one is 3 hours away. I do know there are schools that will play East/West cross over games and they end up driving the length of the state (5-7 hours) for games. We just accept it I guess.

We also only have 3 private schools of any decent size so there tends to not be too much grumbling in that area.

WizardofWashington · Wednesday at 12:36 PM

cornerrat#1 said:
All.... There have been several proposals out of the Sangamo leading the "charge" for the conference by district AD Eucker. I believe the one you have referenced several years ago was #13. Recently another one he submitted for the conference came out if I recall correctly #14 in 2024 which would increase the multipler from 1.65 to 2.5. Like those from the past it never made it far enough down the line for membership to vote on. I'm sure more are coming...... Ratsy

Ah yes Williamsville AD...always seems to be overly concerned about his appearance to district community... Got to stop the big bad private schools

Colin2299 · Wednesday at 4:17 PM

FootballDad1979 said:
You dont think the NIPL would have scholarship policies in place?

Maybe yes, maybe not.

You only need one to create an uproar for an entire district.

Imagine if this was the case last year and Jonas Williams left to go to Mt Carmel. That’s the kind of thing that would happen if they separate. Just my opinion though.

FootballDad1979 · Thursday at 11:42 AM

Colin2299 said:
Maybe yes, maybe not.

You only need one to create an uproar for an entire district.

Imagine if this was the case last year and Jonas Williams left to go to Mt Carmel. That’s the kind of thing that would happen if they separate. Just my opinion though.

NIPL Division I Full Scholarships
NIPL Division II - Partial Scholarships
NIPL Division III - No Scholarships

SiuCubFan8 · Thursday at 2:01 PM

Colin2299 said:
Maybe yes, maybe not.

You only need one to create an uproar for an entire district.

Imagine if this was the case last year and Jonas Williams left to go to Mt Carmel. That’s the kind of thing that would happen if they separate. Just my opinion though.

I'm not saying it will happen like this but the scenario exists where public school talent gets absolutely pillaged in a separation.

Doctor_D · Thursday at 2:29 PM

SiuCubFan8 said:
I'm not saying it will happen like this but the scenario exists where public school talent gets absolutely pillaged in a separation.

This possibility already exists. It already happens to certain suburban schools that don’t have strong programs.
The difference with separation would be that the public schools wouldn’t get beat with “their own” kids.
Just throwing this out there. I’m not at the level of wanting total separation.

Colin2299 · Thursday at 2:38 PM

Doctor_D said:
This possibility already exists. It already happens to certain suburban schools that don’t have strong programs.
The difference with separation would be that the public schools wouldn’t get beat with “their own” kids.
Just throwing this out there. I’m not at the level of wanting total separation.

If they did separate, kids like Tanner Roark come to mind.
Would he stay at Wilmington or would he leave and go to Providence for free to throw the ball and play with a baseball powerhouse.

Doctor_D · Thursday at 3:42 PM

Colin2299 said:
If they did separate, kids like Tanner Roark come to mind.
Would he stay at Wilmington or would he leave and go to Providence for free to throw the ball and play with a baseball powerhouse.

Hard to say. I kinda doubt it based on the overall success that class had going all the way back to when they were little kids, but - maybe?

He did win two state baseball titles (three trophies), got a D1 scholarship and had a pretty solid MLB career, and also got to be an all state football player too, which I’m not sure he would have been allowed to do at some other schools.

Before Reents arrived, way back then… Wilmington would typically have 2 or 3 good athletes per year go to Mac, Providence or JCA. That still happens on occasion, but is much more rare now.

Bishop Mac recruited Damien Anderson aggressively, but he ultimately decided to stay at Wilmington.

It all depends on what the kid is being offered versus what the kid would be leaving behind.

Colin2299 · Thursday at 5:01 PM

Doctor_D said:
Hard to say. I kinda doubt it based on the overall success that class had going all the way back to when they were little kids, but - maybe?

He did win two state baseball titles (three trophies), got a D1 scholarship and had a pretty solid MLB career, and also got to be an all state football player too, which I’m not sure he would have been allowed to do at some other schools.

Before Reents arrived, way back then… Wilmington would typically have 2 or 3 good athletes per year go to Mac, Providence or JCA. That still happens on occasion, but is much more rare now.

Bishop Mac recruited Damien Anderson aggressively, but he ultimately decided to stay at Wilmington.

It all depends on what the kid is being offered versus what the kid would be leaving behind.

Wilmington is as strong a community as there is in this state (at least from an outsiders perspective) but…parents are different these days.

IHSA competitive balance committee minutes

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