OT: CIAC increasing State Championships...

[coachcap]

There will be 8 eventual recognized State Champions, up from last year's four. In my opinion,the CIAC is moving in the wrong direction. This seems like the little league: let's give everyone a participation trophy to feel good about themselves. The CIAC should take the 4 division champions & play them off to an eventual overall State Champion. Who wouldn't have want to see an Ansonia-Southington or Greenwich or Masuk championship for example? This just seems crazy.

 

[freescooter]

You're right. Just give everyone a participation medal. I am in the minority I know but I would do away with State Championships for football in its entirety. No need for it. makes the season too long and hurts other winter sports. And its like they didn't learn anything from last year. December 13 is too late to be playing high school championship games in Connecticut. We get some snow and they'll be playing Christmas Morning. Just give it a rest. Let the kids play their big game on Thanksgiving or the Saturday before and then move on to basketball, indoor track, hockey and such.

 

[uconnbill]

There will be 8 eventual recognized State Champions, up from last year's four. In my opinion,the CIAC is moving in the wrong direction. This seems like the little league: let's give everyone a participation trophy to feel good about themselves. The CIAC should take the 4 division champions & play them off to an eventual overall State Champion. Who wouldn't have want to see an Ansonia-Southington or Greenwich or Masuk championship for example? This just seems crazy.

This was the direction back in the 80's and they changed it in the 90's and now back to the past. Start the season a week earlier ad end the season a week earlier and start the playoffs then and then have Thanksgiving day games and have the finals after that.

 

[uconnbill]

You're right. Just give everyone a participation medal. I am in the minority I know but I would do away with State Championships for football in its entirety. No need for it. makes the season too long and hurts other winter sports. And its like they didn't learn anything from last year. December 13 is too late to be playing high school championship games in Connecticut. We get some snow and they'll be playing Christmas Morning. Just give it a rest. Let the kids play their big game on Thanksgiving or the Saturday before and then move on to basketball, indoor track, hockey and such.

So have state championships in everything but football. Sorry that's not right and nor should that ever happen.

 

[freescooter]

So have state championships in everything but football. Sorry that's not right and nor should that ever happen.

So how do you call, let's say Ansonia, as the state champ if they lose to Derby oops! Naugatuck on Thanksgiving? Kind of makes a mockery of the whole system, no? Football is different and weather conditions aren't conducive to playing here in Connecticut after Thanksgiving. I know it doesn't mean much to folks outside the towns involved, but there are some Thanksgiving Day games that go back decades. Stonington-Westerly, New London-NFA, Derby-Shelton are among the oldest rivaries in the Nation. Heck, if you can't get pumped to play in one of those games there is something wrong with you.

 

[uconnbill]

So how do you call, let's say Ansonia, as the state champ if they lose to Derby oops! Naugatuck on Thanksgiving? Kind of makes a mockery of the whole system, no? Football is different and weather conditions aren't conducive to playing here in Connecticut after Thanksgiving. I know it doesn't mean much to folks outside the towns involved, but there are some Thanksgiving Day games that go back decades. Stonington-Westerly, New London-NFA, Derby-Shelton are among the oldest rivaries in the Nation. Heck, if you can't get pumped to play in one of those games there is something wrong with you.

I love these traditions and I played in a 50th Thanksgiving day game. We went to the state championship the following weekend and played in a championship game. I don't want to see that taken away from the schools, players and coaches. There is a happy medium somewhere and the 8 state champions just waters it down.

 

[huskymedic]

It's crazy... I hope they smarten up after this one year experiment.

http://www.gametimect.com/ciac-football-will-crown-eight-state-champions-2014/

I posted this in a thread in the recruiting forum a bit ago:

Check out this concept... Dude did a lot of work on it and it actually makes a lot of sense (which mean it will probably get tossed ). Bedrock run deep in CT.

Studying geography: Could high school football consider regionalization as basis for playoff structure?
http://www.theday.com/article/20140206/SPORT03/302069481

 

[uconnbill]

It's crazy... I hope they smarten up after this one year experiment.

http://www.gametimect.com/ciac-football-will-crown-eight-state-champions-2014/

I posted this in a thread in the recruiting forum a bit ago:

I have talked to one coach who thinks this is crazy, but nothing can be done this year.

 

[FAIRTIDES]

So have state championships in everything but football. Sorry that's not right and nor should that ever happen.

 

[whaler11]

This was the direction back in the 80's and they changed it in the 90's and now back to the past. Start the season a week earlier ad end the season a week earlier and start the playoffs then and then have Thanksgiving day games and have the finals after that.

Bill has got it. They start the season too late.

 

[DarthGrumpy]

It could be worse.

New Jersey faces the same weather issues as CT, has gotten rid of most of its traditional Thanksgiving rivals, and is still one of the last states not to have a state-wide, class based, football championship (Mass moved to a statewide champion a year or two ago). Since moving here 4 years ago, I am aware of 3 votes taken to create a state-wide football championship (all other sports have one); but, the football coaches keep voting it down because it takes too much time away (and this system does not? Maybe there are the same coaches as the Fairfield county folks).


Instead, Jersey had 23 high school state football sectoinal champsions in 2013 - 5 groups based on size broken into 4 sections (North 1, North 2, Central, South) plus 3 Groups for the Non-Publics. Even though Jersey if 2 ½ times bigger than CT population wise, this is ridiculous.


Note that the non-publics, i.e. Catholic schools, do have a statewide champion. I actually support the non-Publics having such an arrangement as the publics, especially in football, can’t compete with the Catholics who recruit players from a 100 mile radius like Don Bosco, Bergen Catholic, St. Peter’s, etc. do. Losing by 45 points every game does not teach public football players anything.

 

[ktuck911]

Could CT HS football be trying to take a page out of what goes down in FL? Don't they have a ton of divisions down there ( albeit the state being 3 to 4 times bigger than CT ). If that's the case, I kinda get the 'experiment'. Also, keep in mind, we're dealing with kids that would probably relish the moment to be able to play MORE meaningful games. I get the argument that eat cheapens the experience (that what we're already used to), but CT needs to try something different, no? Make CT football matter even more, make it more visible along with giving kids more time to practice/develop along with game time experience. My two cents....

 

[TouchdownHusky]

You're right. Just give everyone a participation medal. I am in the minority I know but I would do away with State Championships for football in its entirety. No need for it. makes the season too long and hurts other winter sports. And its like they didn't learn anything from last year. December 13 is too late to be playing high school championship games in Connecticut. We get some snow and they'll be playing Christmas Morning. Just give it a rest. Let the kids play their big game on Thanksgiving or the Saturday before and then move on to basketball, indoor track, hockey and such.

How about doing what states like Pennsylvania or Ohio (both northern states like Connecticut) do? I thought most fans where in favor of growing the sport of football in Connecticut, not going backwards in time. Granted December 13th was a little late in the game this past year, but start the season earlier in Sept (or even August like down south despite the heat and end it with playoffs.

Could CT HS football be trying to take a page out of what goes down in FL? Don't they have a ton of divisions down there ( albeit the state being 3 to 4 times bigger than CT ). If that's the case, I kinda get the 'experiment'. Also, keep in mind, we're dealing with kids that would probably relish the moment to be able to play MORE meaningful games. I get the argument that eat cheapens the experience (that what we're already used to), but CT needs to try something different, no? Make CT football matter even more, make it more visible along with giving kids more time to practice/develop along with game time experience. My two cents....

"A page out of what goes down in FL? They don't have a ton of divisions down there?' Huh? What? Fact is they have about 8 or 9 divisions down there (check out FHSAA website on football playoffs). The only advantage of downsizing to 4 divisions (LL, L, M and S) would be weeding out the marginal teams and lining up more competitive championships.

 

[BHusky]

I agree that playing games on 3 days rest is crazy and it needed to be adjusted, but what does this new format really solve? Instead of some teams playing 15 games like this past year, they will play 14 which is still ridiculous. The only thing they are doing is cutting 1 playoff game and would give many teams an easier road to a dual state championship. If they want to cut a game, cut the league championship games because you can establish a league champion without having a head to head match up. And in many cases like the FCIAC, the championship game is often a re-match of prior regular season games like this past year. MA used to have an A and B Superbowl per division based on school size and then simply created A and B (1A, 1B, 2A, etc) divisions to avoid same division co-champions. I think they have it right now in that after 7 games they set the playoff teams based on power ranking and playoffs begin week 8 with 8 teams per division (non-qualifiers get a revised schedule to play non-playoff teams to fill out the year). They take a 1 week playoff break to have the traditional Thanksgiving games and then the championship is the state championship is the next week. Teams playing into the last week are only playing 12 games and teams not in the playoffs are still able to get a full schedule in of 11 games. True State Champs are established, regular seasons are not impacted, the number of games is not excessive and Thanksgiving games are continued.

 

[freescooter]

If you insist on a playoff system,

• Break the state into 9 team "leagues" (you can have a combination of leagues and divisions if you want to keep groupings like CCC for all sports) roughly by size and geography, so every league is made up of either LL, L, M, or S schools,
  
• have an 8 game season, starting in early September ending the end of October, when every other fall sport ends.
  
• Autobid to the top team in each league plus ties and the next X to get to 16 and start your playoffs the first weekend in November with finals the Saturday after Thanksgiving.
  
• 8 games is a reasonable schedule for everybody. The State Champs would play a maximum of 4 additional games.
  
• Screw tradition. No need to play on Thanksgiving. World won't end if New London doesn't play Norwich Free Academy.
  
• And everything is wrapped up before the worst weather comes around and it doesn't interfere with winter sports. Everybody is happy more or less.
  
• As to the question of leagues, there will probably be the odd outlier here and there and you might have to have a couple of 10 team leagues or maybe an 8 to make the numbers work, in which case everyone would have a team they don't play in a given year or a team they play twice, depending on league size. No big deal.

15-16 high school games is far too many. You'd be done before the weather turns really bad. Everyone would get a chance to play as many games as many D3 colleges play, The best teams move on and play up to 4 additional games and you get to have 4 State Champs by size. Personally I'd re-shuffle the leagues maybe every 5 years based on changes in enrollment. So if you are Class M in 2015, you're Class M for 5 years. You don't move up or down because of minor changes in enrollment in a given year as happens today. New schools with teams for the first time play in the most appropriate league by size and geography until the next "realignment."

 

[FDNY99]

I look at this as another in a LONG list of bonehead moves by the CIAC. But then again like Coach Cap said...in the day of the everyone gets a trophy age..this falls right in line.

 

[ktuck911]

How about doing what states like Pennsylvania or Ohio (both northern states like Connecticut) do? I thought most fans where in favor of growing the sport of football in Connecticut, not going backwards in time. Granted December 13th was a little late in the game this past year, but start the season earlier in Sept (or even August like down south despite the heat and end it with playoffs.





"A page out of what goes down in FL? They don't have a ton of divisions down there?' Huh? What? Fact is they have about 8 or 9 divisions down there (check out FHSAA website on football playoffs). The only advantage of downsizing to 4 divisions (LL, L, M and S) would be weeding out the marginal teams and lining up more competitive championships.

Where did u play HS football bro?

 

[Palatine]

If you play the games at the Rent, it gives more opportunities for kids to play on that field. So I have no problem with it.

Every other league keeps adding wildcard and playoff teams, why not more championships?

 

[uconnbill]

The big issue is why doesn't the CIAC start the season earlier. Soccer, Crew, Cross Country and swimming all start at the beginning of September and yet football is put off till the third weekend.

I would agree that 15 games is to much and that 13 should be the most and that includes conference championships.

 

[BHusky]

If you play the games at the Rent, it gives more opportunities for kids to play on that field. So I have no problem with it.

Every other league keeps adding wildcard and playoff teams, why not more championships?

This change was not done to give more teams a chance to win a championship. The change was done to reduce the number of games because of health concerns with kids playing 15 games, some with only 3 days rest between games when they make the playoffs. The result of this change for teams who played 15 games last year will instead be 14 games which is still ridiculous. These kids will play as many games as FCS playoff teams and more than all FBS teams in a shorter season. If health is really a concern they need to get the games down to 11-12 like they used to be and/or think about starting the season sooner. Regardless, reducing the season to a reasonable amount of games will require a lot more than just creating 2, 4 team playoffs by division.

 

[freescooter]

I agree with BHusky. That's why my plan calls for 8 regular season games, followed by a 4 week playoff in 4 divisions. It would allow 64 teams to play 9 games, 32 play 10, 16 play 11, 8 play 12. Four "Champions" is a reasonable number for a state this size. There are roughly 150 teams, I think. The divisions don't need to be perfectly matched but they ought to be close.

 

[Carl Spackler]

My opinion:

CIAC as a beaurocratic governing body, is essentially working with the same modus operandi that the State Legislature works with in decision making to make "progress".

 

[DarthGrumpy]

I agree with BHusky. That's why my plan calls for 8 regular season games, followed by a 4 week playoff in 4 divisions. It would allow 64 teams to play 9 games, 32 play 10, 16 play 11, 8 play 12. Four "Champions" is a reasonable number for a state this size. There are roughly 150 teams, I think. The divisions don't need to be perfectly matched but they ought to be close.

I believe that this is similar to what NY State schools (outside of NYC and Long Island do). Regular season games followed up to 5 playoff games (semi & district final followed by up to 3 rounds district match-ups) while the non-playoff teams get pooled into 2 end of the season games while the play-offs happen.

 

[freescooter]

If you play the games at the Rent, it gives more opportunities for kids to play on that field. So I have no problem with it.

Every other league keeps adding wildcard and playoff teams, why not more championships?

Pal,
They moved the games from the Rent. Way too expensive to operate for crowds of 2-3000. Plus it has natural grass so is not great for multiple games. They moved the games to Central Connecticut's Stadium which is A. Less costly to operate. B. has artificial turf, C. Is still a college facility. Is much more appropriately sized for the crowds.

 

[Bootsthemonkey]

The CIAC collects the gate $$$ at all playoff games. They don't want to reduce the number of games, and they don't want an increased chance of snow disrupting their field arrangements and reducing the size of crowds as it did this year. It has nothing to do with participation levels or worrying about kids playing too many games. It's about $$$ going into CIAC pockets. From my understanding there isn't a coach out there that is fond of this plan.