State Duals Split into Big School/Little School

[bigedcoach 27]

Word has it that next years state duals will be split into Big School, Little School, Honestly Im not a fan of this, its weakens the quality of wrestling in this part of a state championship. Here is how things would be laid out, #1 the scariest thing I have heard was they are only going to take 1 big school and 1 small school from each region

Region 1

Small School -Union, UHA, Tilghman, Caldwell, Fort Campbell

Big School-Hopkinsville, Christian, Daviess, Ohio, Apollo Calloway

Region 2

Small School - Larue, Ft. Knox, Danville

Large School - Anderson, North Hardin, John Hardin, Central Hardin, Boyle Co, Nelson Co

Region 3

Small School- Desales, Holy Cross, Shawnee@

Big School- Bullitt East, Bullitt Central, Meade, Southern, Fairdale, Valley, Western, Doss, PRP, Iroquois

Region 4

Small School- Central, KSB@

Large School- Trinity, STX, Moore, Seneca, Manual, Atherton

Region 5

Small School - KCD@

Large School- North Oldham, South Oldham, Oldham, Spencer, Male, Jtown, Fern Creek Eastern

Region 6

Small School- Walton Verona, Bishop Brossart, Newport

Big School- Ryle, Campbell, Conner, Cooper, Simon Kenton, Dixie Heights, Grant, Scott, Holmes, Boone

Region 7

Small School- Western Hills, Bourbon, Frankfort@

Big School - Woodford, Franklin, Henrey Clay, Lafayette, Harrison, Bryan Station, Tates Creek, Madison Central, Dunbar, Montgomery, Scott Co

Region 8

Small School- Wayne, McCreary, Sheldon Clark,Prestonburg,Lawrence, Harlan, Belfery

Big School - Johnson Central, Letcher Co Central, Perry Co Central, Ashland Paul Blazer, Whitley County

@ = assigned a region but no team competing

in this years state duals the following teams would not have made it

St X

Simon Kenton

Franklin County

Fort Campbell

Eastern

Big School Tournament would have

Ohio / Christian

Anderson

Southern

Trinity

Oldham

Woodford

Campbell

Johnson Central

Small School tournament

Union

Larue

Desales

Central-only small school in the 4th region

No 5th region school

Walton Verona

Bourbon Co

Wayne Co

No insult to the teams that would be in , but this isnt a fair representation of the quality of wrestling that is in the state of KY. To my count there are 86 active wrestling schools in the state of KY of which 22 fall in the catagory of small school 26% now if we add more schools and the percentage of schools get to 35% or greater then maybe we should split. 90% of the new programs that have been added in the last 3 years have been big school and its not because there isnt a class championship. To grow programs its going to take emphasis on youth programs and money resources to help get these small schools off the ground

I hope some more people can give insight on this

[halfhalfhalf 121]

Your hearing wrong. I was told top 2 teams in BS/SS qualify. So that helps anyone in region 1 and 2 who face union and larue.

[Jacketcoach 19]

Coach McCoy and the KYWCA have been working on an alignment plan for over a year. The State will be split into Big School / Small School as voted on by the coaches for a two year trial period. Both Big School and Small School divisions will be split into 6 sectionals based on Geography. I know they are still tying up some loose ends but should have work completed very soon.

Two teams will come out of each sectional to create a 12 team tournament at each level.

The goal of this is to increase participation in hopes that more schools will add wrestling in the near future.

[DamonMBarnes 13]

Not a fan at all. The small school tournament should just be changed to a dual between Union and LaRue as it would save a lot of time and travel. If there was an option for the small schools to opt-in to the big school tournament then I would probably view it more favorably.

[DamonMBarnes 13]

A change I would like to see happen is to move it from Henry Clay. If you want to increase participation in the state a good option would be to have events in other areas of the state. Now that the individual state championship is in Lexington they have a monopoly on the wrestling state championships. I know last year when there were talks of where to move the state championship I researched the driving distances and Louisville was just as close if not closer on average than Lexington. But more importantly, the Louisville Metro Population dwarfs the Lexington Metro Population. More people = more attendance and more interest.

[Jacketcoach 19]

l

[thomam 11]

what is the cut-off for big school/small school? We have 750 kids in our building.... maybe

[Tim Reynolds 7]

Louisville needs to host more wrestling events. It's central geographically and it's where the population clusters are. Most of the teams are from N Ky or the Louisville area, yet they all have to drive to Lexington.

Eastern Ky sure must have a lobby!

[bigedcoach 27]

So there is going to be a Coaches association alignment and a KHSAA alignment?

I seperated big school / small school by football class subdivisions 1A-3A small school and 4A - 6A in big

I agree Louisville should host more events the problem is for the state tournament there are no hotels since state tournament falls on the weekend that the farm machinery show falls on and the venues are more expensive to rent in Louisville. State duals could be held at Valley HS new gym when its opened, it was built to host major tournaments in Jefferson Co.

[bigedcoach 27]

Maybe if the Coaches association could do this, Have a small school or "All A classic" and invite all 22 teams to the tournament. do this on a seperate weekend than state duals

[DamonMBarnes 13]

Maybe if the Coaches association could do this, Have a small school or "All A classic" and invite all 22 teams to the tournament. do this on a seperate weekend than state duals

This is a pretty good compromise and an event that might actually promote some growth as it will be something else to give wrestling exposure. Is anyone familiar with how basketball decides which teams are invited to the "All A Classic"?

[bigedcoach 27]

they have actual district and regional tournaments, for schools that would fall under class 2A in football

1 little piece of trivia in wrestling, unless Im wrong there is only 1 wrestling school in the state that doesnt have a football program, UVA

[ukpridewrestler11 276]

Do u mean UHA? University heights academy. School of about 100 students in hoptown.

[oldwrestler81 6]

Are we creeping towards splitting the regualar state tounament into two or more divisions again? I sure hope not!

[Jacketcoach 19]

The split was right around 1030 or so.

[halfhalfhalf 121]

I can promise you if you split schools into large and small for individual it will be horrible quality. I could see more of a public private split if you split individual

[bigedcoach 27]

i meant UHA

[bulldog-leader 56]

jacketcoach; I think you are correct. While coaching at Holmes old Coach Webb told me that we (Holmes) were the largest school in the small school division and Dixie heights was the smallest school in the big school division.

That was 10 years ago, I'm not sure if they changed the division since then.

[WrestlingMan 0]

horriable idea!

[mat-king 4]

Not enough schools to do this

[Brave Soul 0]

This is retarded! The old format worked for years and there's no need to change it now

[Grappleking 3]

Matney has always tried to get the small/large schools seperated. He thinks it will help the growth of the sport. I think if its going to be done a complete re-alignment needs to be done. Not just for the state duals. I think its a horrible idea as described now.

[bigedcoach 27]

Matney has always tried to get the small/large schools seperated. He thinks it will help the growth of the sport. I think if its going to be done a complete re-alignment needs to be done. Not just for the state duals. I think its a horrible idea as described now.

I remember one state coaches meeting, Jim Matney wanted to fight because of the big/small school split. The whole concept is thatif you split you would promote. Which hasnt done, 90% of the schools added have been 5 and 6 A schools, even setting the split line at 1030 is raising the bar too high too classify what a small school is when 1030 is all most a 5 A school,(1050 is the enrollment for 5 A) They dont even use the words state championship in the All "A" classic

Have a tournament , invite the 22 schools that are 3A and lower and have either an individual or duals tournament and lets keep promoting youth wrestling and trying to get a program started in the Bowling Green Area and other areas that dont have wrestling

[Jacketcoach 19]

The difference is football goes by boy population. Each "A" counts for like 100 boys. This is what makes Central a 3 A football team. We have a smidge over 300 boys/ 700 girls!

[Charger Coach 14]

Individual state should never think about going to a class system until the sport grows further. We simply don't have enough teams in the state to support such a measure. I would rather see it go back to the district, regional, state format before that happens. However, the split to a big school / small school dual championship will have both its negatives and positives and is feasible. I personally think there are more negatives especially in the small school division. I guess we'll never really know for sure until after the 2 year trial period. If it's growth and participation we're after, then I think as a state, we're on the right track. Simply look at the high school and youth programs that have been added in the last five years or so. I know we've lost some programs, but the gains have fair outweighed that. I know of at least a few schools that are wanting or willing to start a wrestling program, but they simply don't have anybody to run them. We always seem to want to emphasize participation at the wrestler level, but what about the coaching level? I think that is just as important if not more important in many aspects.