Div I, Region 4 Playoff Thread

PS: Funny how for years Coombs and then Bolden were chided by all the football "experts" by sticking with the Triple Option and yet, it proved to be the best, most consistent form of winning for a Division 1 public school in the state during and since. Wonder if Tom would consider dusting off that playbook and bringing it to West Chester? ;)

Take a couple of those DB speedsters in a triple option, and I think LW would still be practicing this week prepping for Springfield.
 
He needs to fire Beauchamp and find an elite offensive mind that can carry him just a little bit offensively. There are a lot of great options even at the local level. The defenses have been there for LW to be able to make a run.
Gerry did a helluva job at La Salle.
 
He isn't at Lakota West, that's for sure. Not sure how much of Bolden dabbling in the offense has to do with that though.
Yeah, I'd imagine its some dabbling and mostly personnel as players like Jeremy Larkin, Jarell White and Nick Watson are luxuries at the HS level. I guess sometimes the game can pass you by too.
 
Take a couple of those DB speedsters in a triple option, and I think LW would still be practicing this week prepping for Springfield.
Yes and no. It worked for Colerain because they ran it from the youth level all the way up to varsity and had a 20+ year infrastructure in place. It takes time to put that infrastructure in place. You need a QB that has experience making those reads and you need an offensive line that knows those blocking assignments. Short of that, a power spread with a read option heavy offense should have been what they run (Bolden's teams at Colerain with LA Ramsby did this). They have the personnel to do very well with that, especially with Wiles. At times, their offense did do that this year, but they still failed to establish any sort of push with their offensive line to create an inside run game. Lakota West's offensive line was pretty bad this year, even by GMC standards. Colerain always had a good offensive line. That's a major difference.
 
To piggyback on the offense they should run, they should copy the Doug Ramsay/Scott Datillo QB-heavy run game that features QB power, QB counter, HB power, and HB counter. Elder runs it very well with a great offensive line and hit-or-miss skill talent. In years they have good skill talent, they build more of a passing game off of this. Sycamore runs it very well even without a good offensive line, getting their best athlete the ball with a maximum number of blockers.

Lakota West was running jet sweeps and inverted veers this year, asking Remy or others on the jet sweep to simply outrun the defense without any blocking or asking Wiles to go face-first into a LB in the hole. That offense broke down against anyone good and then the spread passing game they were supposed to have simply doesn't work without an offensive line that can pass block.
 
Off the top of my head, Princeton would have won the region in 1990 and likely 1988 before that.

My guess is Fairfield won the region in 1986.
In 1994 Colerain, X, Wayne, and Hamilton were the 4 playoff teams. Considering Hamilton only won its first playoff game in 2023, that means 1994 Colerain, X, or Wayne won which means my list can go back 1 year. I just don't know who won.

1993 You have Moeller, X, Princeton and Centerville. So you have a 50% chance of it going back to 1993.

1992 You have X, Anderson, Princeton, and Northmont.
 
To piggyback on the offense they should run, they should copy the Doug Ramsay/Scott Datillo QB-heavy run game that features QB power, QB counter, HB power, and HB counter. Elder runs it very well with a great offensive line and hit-or-miss skill talent. In years they have good skill talent, they build more of a passing game off of this. Sycamore runs it very well even without a good offensive line, getting their best athlete the ball with a maximum number of blockers.
I agree Elder runs it well, but it only gets you so far, and you rarely beat teams with high level athletes. It also almost completely takes away the TE because they are blocking 99% of the time to get the "pad on pad" advantage in that offense.

Elder used to have great balance with very skilled passing QBs and some of their best athletes at receiver. They just don't have that level of talent anymore, so this offense for them in almost out of necessity.

Elder has had 4 guys that played TE at Elder on college rosters (3 football, 1 basketball) over the last 4 years, and none of them were threats in this offense at Elder. They were all very skilled, athletic, had good size and could move for big guys, and they had close to no impact in the passing game (Larkins, Kirch, Browne, Boeing). It was mind boggling that they never even entertained some of their best athletes on the field.
 
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In 1994 Colerain, X, Wayne, and Hamilton were the 4 playoff teams. Considering Hamilton only won its first playoff game in 2023, that means 1994 Colerain, X, or Wayne won which means my list can go back 1 year. I just don't know who won.

1993 You have Moeller, X, Princeton and Centerville. So you have a 50% chance of it going back to 1993.

1992 You have X, Anderson, Princeton, and Northmont.
1994 was Colerain. 1993 it was Moeller who lost in the state finals to Ignatius. In 1992, it was St. X who won region 4 and lost 24-14 to Ignatius in the state final as I was at that game.
 
In 1994 Colerain, X, Wayne, and Hamilton were the 4 playoff teams. Considering Hamilton only won its first playoff game in 2023, that means 1994 Colerain, X, or Wayne won which means my list can go back 1 year. I just don't know who won.

1993 You have Moeller, X, Princeton and Centerville. So you have a 50% chance of it going back to 1993.

1992 You have X, Anderson, Princeton, and Northmont.
Fairly certain Princeton lost in the state championship game to Warren Harding in 1990.

Also, I believe Fairfield won the state championship in 1986. A team from Cincinnati did not win the big school championship again until Elder in 2002 and 2003.
 
1972 Princeton
1973 Moeller
1974 Moeller
1975 Moeller
1977 Moeller
1978 Princeton
1979 Moeller
1980 Moeller
1981 Moeller
1982 Moeller
1983 Princeton
1984 Centerville
1985 Moeller
1986 Fairfield
1987 Princeton
1988 Princeton
1989 Moeller
1990 Princeton
1991 Centerville
1992 X
1993 Moeller
1994 Colerain
1995 Colerain*
1996 Elder
1997 Moeller
1998 X
1999 Wayne
2000 Colerain
2001 X
2002 Elder
2003 Elder
2004 Colerain
2005 X
2006 Colerain
2007 X
2008 Elder
2009 Elder
2010 Wayne
2011 X
2012 Moeller
2013 Moeller/ Hillard Davidson**
2014 Wayne/ Moeller***
2015 Wayne/ Colerain ***
2016 X
2017 Colerain
2018 Colerain
2019 Elder
2020 X
2021 Moeller
2022 Moeller
2023 Moeller

I just wanted somewhere with a list of who won Region 4.



* Colerain forfeited
** Hillard Davidson was not a "Region 4" team in the years of 2 regions
*** Moeller and Colerain would have won a Regional Championship under the 4 Region format in the years or the 2 regions.


All-Time State Tournament Results


Only Colerain, Elder, Moeller, X, and Wayne have won the region since 1992.

Only 8 schools have won the region Colerain, Elder, Moeller, X, Wayne, Princeton, Centerville, and Fairfield.

OHSAA has had playoffs for 51 years. When you take into account the years of two Regions and making it to the final 4 you would have 53 Region 4 Champ teams.

Moeller 18
Colerain 8
X 8
Elder 6
Princeton 6
Wayne 4
Centerville 2
Fairfield 1

So all but three have been won by Moeller, Colerain, X, Elder, Princeton, and Wayne.
 
To piggyback on the offense they should run, they should copy the Doug Ramsay/Scott Datillo QB-heavy run game that features QB power, QB counter, HB power, and HB counter. Elder runs it very well with a great offensive line and hit-or-miss skill talent. In years they have good skill talent, they build more of a passing game off of this. Sycamore runs it very well even without a good offensive line, getting their best athlete the ball with a maximum number of blockers.

Lakota West was running jet sweeps and inverted veers this year, asking Remy or others on the jet sweep to simply outrun the defense without any blocking or asking Wiles to go face-first into a LB in the hole. That offense broke down against anyone good and then the spread passing game they were supposed to have simply doesn't work without an offensive line that can pass block.
LW is not a power team. They suck at it, I would even say.
 
Yes and no. It worked for Colerain because they ran it from the youth level all the way up to varsity and had a 20+ year infrastructure in place. It takes time to put that infrastructure in place. You need a QB that has experience making those reads and you need an offensive line that knows those blocking assignments. Short of that, a power spread with a read option heavy offense should have been what they run (Bolden's teams at Colerain with LA Ramsby did this). They have the personnel to do very well with that, especially with Wiles. At times, their offense did do that this year, but they still failed to establish any sort of push with their offensive line to create an inside run game. Lakota West's offensive line was pretty bad this year, even by GMC standards. Colerain always had a good offensive line. That's a major difference.

I think Wiles could have been that guy to run it, or Remy. You bring up a good point. It's not something you can just switch to easily. They would need an entire summer of practicing it, and then a whole regular season to really get it down.
 
Yes and no. It worked for Colerain because they ran it from the youth level all the way up to varsity and had a 20+ year infrastructure in place. It takes time to put that infrastructure in place. You need a QB that has experience making those reads and you need an offensive line that knows those blocking assignments. Short of that, a power spread with a read option heavy offense should have been what they run (Bolden's teams at Colerain with LA Ramsby did this). They have the personnel to do very well with that, especially with Wiles. At times, their offense did do that this year, but they still failed to establish any sort of push with their offensive line to create an inside run game. Lakota West's offensive line was pretty bad this year, even by GMC standards. Colerain always had a good offensive line. That's a major difference.

No they didn't. Little Cards was Northside K of C until well into Coombs tenure and has been 3 different organizations since that time using the Colerain/Cardinal name. Bolden was only involved in so much to watch his kids play in the 2nd Little Cards organization. I had more kids on my team that played for X, Lasalle, or didn't even play in high school than actually did for Colerain.

There was no say on what even the middle schools ran let alone a private organization working outside of the school system. NWLSD is too messed up and political to have the Head Coach have any real power at the Middle school. And they are too many wanna be Dads and Uncles coaching pee wee football to be have that kind of sway there. And even if you wanted to, no 3rd and 4th graders would actually be able to run the veer option.

The entire concept for Coombs/Rick Haynes was twofold. In high school, 1) you won't always have a QB who can throw well and 2) you won't always have enough big kids to have great offensive line. The whole point was to be able to have smaller quick kids who could move in space, have less people to block, and utilize angles and double teams.

Colerain's problem was that all the knowledge of that system left at some point and Bolden never did a good job of teaching it to any new coaches before he left. All the knowledge of checks and adjustments to defenses was lost.

Whether its ego or knowing that the players and parents don't want to run it, I don't think Bolden would go back. Even if this year was great year to use it to overcome your two known deficiencies.
 
To piggyback on the offense they should run, they should copy the Doug Ramsay/Scott Datillo QB-heavy run game that features QB power, QB counter, HB power, and HB counter. Elder runs it very well with a great offensive line and hit-or-miss skill talent. In years they have good skill talent, they build more of a passing game off of this. Sycamore runs it very well even without a good offensive line, getting their best athlete the ball with a maximum number of blockers.

Lakota West was running jet sweeps and inverted veers this year, asking Remy or others on the jet sweep to simply outrun the defense without any blocking or asking Wiles to go face-first into a LB in the hole. That offense broke down against anyone good and then the spread passing game they were supposed to have simply doesn't work without an offensive line that can pass block.
Your second paragraph is an uninformed half baked notion of West's offense. There's more complexity to the situation than you seem to understand. As for running the 'same offenses' Elder and Sycamore run? West has beaten both of those teams in consecutive years. Sycamore in the last five. Probably not the best suggestion you've made, but noted.
 
The entire concept for Coombs/Rick Haynes was twofold. In high school, 1) you won't always have a QB who can throw well and 2) you won't always have enough big kids to have great offensive line. The whole point was to be able to have smaller quick kids who could move in space, have less people to block, and utilize angles and double teams.

Colerain's problem was that all the knowledge of that system left at some point and Bolden never did a good job of teaching it to any new coaches before he left. All the knowledge of checks and adjustments to defenses was lost.

Whether its ego or knowing that the players and parents don't want to run it, I don't think Bolden would go back. Even if this year was great year to use it to overcome your two known deficiencies.
The fact that the new coach went about as far away as possible from this tells you all you need to know that he was the wrong hire.
 
Colerain's problem was that all the knowledge of that system left at some point and Bolden never did a good job of teaching it to any new coaches before he left. All the knowledge of checks and adjustments to defenses was lost.
Lol. Coombs and Haynes filmed an entire movie about how to run the triple. All the information is there for them to run it successfully. Bolden ran his own very modern version of the triple using a lot of what he learned from Coombs and Haynes. I’m sure if you’re in that Colerain staff you could easily absorb that same knowledge. Problem is, when Bolden left Colerain, his former staff also dispersed. His defensive coordinator followed him two years later. To my knowledge there is only one Bolden-era coach currently at Colerain.
 
The fact that the new coach went about as far away as possible from this tells you all you need to know that he was the wrong hire.
And I’m sure a lot of that is that coach trying to build his own identity and not spending his career being compared to Coombs and Bolden. The triple option is a staple of traditional Colerain football.
 
And I’m sure a lot of that is that coach trying to build his own identity and not spending his career being compared to Coombs and Bolden. The triple option is a staple of traditional Colerain football.
Well, he has certainly built his own identity. He should be embarrassed to come back. Very little control of his team.
 
Winning was the staple. Triple option was just what worked at the time. If Colerain went 10-0 going 5 wide on every play, no one would care and it would be "Kerry who?".
I can agree with that. But Colerain’s schematic philosophy of the Triple Option and 50 Slant defense was recognized even on a national level. Back in the Ohio vs USA days I remember even out of state teams spoke highly of Colerain’s deeply-rooted offense.
 
Pretty incredible the decline of overall talent in R4. For Moeller to not be able to beat that Springfield team is downright shocking. A COH-also-ran in Pick North goes to Elder and wins at the Pit. But hey, Princeton got that great non-SWO win up at Elyria! It's becoming like the Pac12 where they inflate each other's resumes with conference wins and can't do anything outside their area.
 
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