Hope This is Not a Sign of the Times...

BeaverAchiever

BeaverAchiever

Active member
Just found out that East Clinton, a Southwest District, D-VI school will not field a women's basketball team this season. Just a few years (2022 tournament) removed from a D-III regional final appearance, losing to eventual state champ Purcell-Marion. They were 21-6 overall that year, 23-3 in 2022-23 and losing in the regional semi-final and 4-18 last season. Apparently, they did not have enough girls come out to field a team for this season. :(
 
 
Women's sports numbers are down in a lot of area unfortunately for multiple sports. Many colleges across the nation at DII,DIII and JUCO levels have had to shut gym doors on programs. Its all a trickle down to high school numbers. It sucks for how the state of women's basketball and sports. Economy has a lot to do with it for young people in general now. The kids get to working age and their families or parents actually need that extra income to survive harder times.
 
I heard of a local team calling former basketball players to encourage them to play in order to field a JV team. Not sure if they achieved that goal but it was an eye opener.
 
A team on our girls' non-conference schedule advanced to the regional final during the COVID year. 2024-2025 will be the second year in a row that they have now not had enough players for a JV team.

It is a very sad sign of the times.
 
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So many thoughts on this...so I'll throw some out.
  • This isn't necessarily new. My daughter played her senior year (2013-14) at a small high school with no JV team. Over the years I've seen many 2 quarter JV teams.
Causes
  • Volleyball. There was a time when club volleyball BEGAN in March. Now these clubs have tryouts right after high school wraps up and start "training".
  • Basketball is a more difficult sport. Yes it is. In basketball, you have contact with the opponent, many times it's physical due to the talent level of players. Basketball encompasses many skill sets. Dribbling, passing, shooting, defense, rebounding. In volleyball, generally you're either a hitter or back row player. A few do both. But the skill sets are much fewer.
  • This one of more of a evolution thing. We see kids start playing sports at age 4-5-6 years old. If a kid gets to high school and is still playing, that may be 10 years of organized sports. Bulletin, girls are wired different than boys. Boys will generally compete and keep competing. Many times I see girls when they get to 14-15-16 years old, they're tired of the rat race. If they are not a standout player, they many times just stop playing. They want to have a life, boyfriend, job, car, etc. I think we don't do a good job realizing what we put kids through growing up.
  • Too much training in sports. Kids that are multi sport athletes are pulled every direction nearly 12 months out of the year. Parents/ coaches need to enforce down time, especially for girls.
Schools start with a small group of true female athletes. You have to make it as easy for them to play multiple sports as possible.
 
14Red said:
So many thoughts on this...so I'll throw some out.
  • This isn't necessarily new. My daughter played her senior year (2013-14) at a small high school with no JV team. Over the years I've seen many 2 quarter JV teams.
Causes
  • Volleyball. There was a time when club volleyball BEGAN in March. Now these clubs have tryouts right after high school wraps up and start "training".
  • Basketball is a more difficult sport. Yes it is. In basketball, you have contact with the opponent, many times it's physical due to the talent level of players. Basketball encompasses many skill sets. Dribbling, passing, shooting, defense, rebounding. In volleyball, generally you're either a hitter or back row player. A few do both. But the skill sets are much fewer.
  • This one of more of a evolution thing. We see kids start playing sports at age 4-5-6 years old. If a kid gets to high school and is still playing, that may be 10 years of organized sports. Bulletin, girls are wired different than boys. Boys will generally compete and keep competing. Many times I see girls when they get to 14-15-16 years old, they're tired of the rat race. If they are not a standout player, they many times just stop playing. They want to have a life, boyfriend, job, car, etc. I think we don't do a good job realizing what we put kids through growing up.
  • Too much training in sports. Kids that are multi sport athletes are pulled every direction nearly 12 months out of the year. Parents/ coaches need to enforce down time, especially for girls.
Schools start with a small group of true female athletes. You have to make it as easy for them to play multiple sports as possible.
Click to expand...
Don't forget...girls are playing softball year round as well..spring season, travel team, fall ball, travel team, indoor winter ball...non-stop

I do agree basketball is harder to play. It is important for girls and boys to start playing basketball at very young age because it requires so many skill sets. They don't need to play year round, but its a lot easier to pick up softball and vball at a later age and still be decent at it. Too many girls walking into MS with no experience or skill set...the chances of them continuing in HS is low.

EVERYONE IS GOING PRO!!! :)
 
realball4468 said:
Don't forget...girls are playing softball year round as well..spring season, travel team, fall ball, travel team, indoor winter ball...non-stop

I do agree basketball is harder to play. It is important for girls and boys to start playing basketball at very young age because it requires so many skill sets. They don't need to play year round, but its a lot easier to pick up softball and vball at a later age and still be decent at it. Too many girls walking into MS with no experience or skill set...the chances of them continuing in HS is low.

EVERYONE IS GOING PRO!!! :)
Click to expand...
Basketball involved running and banging into your opponent. Girls, in general, don't like that. You really can't do much to inhibit travel sports, but the schools can put a limit on "out of season" workouts, including "lifting" for football. Sadly many times kids take the path of least resistance. You go to a typical 15 year old girl and offer 6 days a week of basketball games or practices vs. 2 days a week of volleyball practices, you know what's going to get selected. Crazy thing is parents are more than willing to pay thousands of dollars for travel sports and school sports at most schools are free?? It's incredible to me how much some of these club volleyball teams charge for players.
 
Agree with the posters. I would also toss in the fact that Ohio's population in the more rural areas is shrinking and is projected to continue. This means fewer kids in the schools and thus fewer qualified athletes.
 
14Red said:
So many thoughts on this...so I'll throw some out.
  • This isn't necessarily new. My daughter played her senior year (2013-14) at a small high school with no JV team. Over the years I've seen many 2 quarter JV teams.
Causes
  • Volleyball. There was a time when club volleyball BEGAN in March. Now these clubs have tryouts right after high school wraps up and start "training".
  • Basketball is a more difficult sport. Yes it is. In basketball, you have contact with the opponent, many times it's physical due to the talent level of players. Basketball encompasses many skill sets. Dribbling, passing, shooting, defense, rebounding. In volleyball, generally you're either a hitter or back row player. A few do both. But the skill sets are much fewer.
  • This one of more of a evolution thing. We see kids start playing sports at age 4-5-6 years old. If a kid gets to high school and is still playing, that may be 10 years of organized sports. Bulletin, girls are wired different than boys. Boys will generally compete and keep competing. Many times I see girls when they get to 14-15-16 years old, they're tired of the rat race. If they are not a standout player, they many times just stop playing. They want to have a life, boyfriend, job, car, etc. I think we don't do a good job realizing what we put kids through growing up.
  • Too much training in sports. Kids that are multi sport athletes are pulled every direction nearly 12 months out of the year. Parents/ coaches need to enforce down time, especially for girls.
Schools start with a small group of true female athletes. You have to make it as easy for them to play multiple sports as possible.
Click to expand...
I agree with your accessment.

I would like for OHSSA to institute a no school sport dead period. From July1-15 every summer. No basketball, no lifting, no conditioning, no 7on 7. Nothing. Let’s teams do their summer stuff in June and fall sports to get started 2 weeks early. Would allow parents to schedule family events or vacations. Maybe a kid could go to Cedar Point or swimming.

Some would choose to play travel basebal, AAU or go work with a trainer. That would be their choice.
 
zski71 said:
You are completely wrong about softball.
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I agree 100%. Having a daughter who played both at a decent level I can tell you for sure that softball would be much harder to pick up later in life. Hitting a baseball or softball at a high level is one of the most difficult things in sports. And if your daughter wants to pitch then expect a much bigger commitment to skill achievement.
 
CGradADad said:
I agree with your accessment.

I would like for OHSSA to institute a no school sport dead period. From July1-15 every summer. No basketball, no lifting, no conditioning, no 7on 7. Nothing. Let’s teams do their summer stuff in June and fall sports to get started 2 weeks early. Would allow parents to schedule family events or vacations. Maybe a kid could go to Cedar Point or swimming.

Some would choose to play travel basebal, AAU or go work with a trainer. That would be their choice.
Click to expand...
Many schools already have this instituted in their schools and I'd guess the OHSAA doesn't like to meddle with local decisions. I think schools need to get a feel of their programs and athletes. I don't know how we can ever incentivize kids to play sports. Schools offer these extracurricular activities, most are free or have little individual cost, yet we just keep losing kids and losing kids. Heck even homeschool kids in your districts are allowed to play with the local school team and that doesn't seem to have helped.
Maybe we need to thin down the youth sports, and make kids hungry to play school sponsored sports when they get there. I think many are burned out by the time they even get to 7th / 8th grade.
 
CGradADad said:
I agree with your accessment.

I would like for OHSSA to institute a no school sport dead period. From July1-15 every summer. No basketball, no lifting, no conditioning, no 7on 7. Nothing. Let’s teams do their summer stuff in June and fall sports to get started 2 weeks early. Would allow parents to schedule family events or vacations. Maybe a kid could go to Cedar Point or swimming.

Some would choose to play travel basebal, AAU or go work with a trainer. That would be their choice.
Click to expand...
I really think this is the only way you actually get schools to give the dead period. I would also like to see a practice prohibition around Christmas to allow families to actually celebrate Christmas/holiday of choice. Something like 24-26 no practice. I know of a coach would have practice late on 12/24 then really early on 12/26 and severely punish for missing either.
 
I'll also add that the HS basketball season is extremely long and covers a period of the calendar when you're asking kids to give up 2 longer breaks (Thanksgiving and Christmas) and 2 long weekends (MLK Jr. and President's Day). A few years ago, I asked a handful of the more athletic girls at my school why they don't play basketball, and they cited the length of the season as their main objection. I mentioned how long the HS volleyball season is, and they didn't mind it because of how much of the pre-competition activities take place before the school year starts. They come in and practice for a couple hours in the morning and then go back to enjoying their summer.

This year is the 2nd time in 7 years that my school is not fielding a JV girls basketball team. Only 12 girls came out to play this year.
 
Mr. Slippery said:
I'll also add that the HS basketball season is extremely long and covers a period of the calendar when you're asking kids to give up 2 longer breaks (Thanksgiving and Christmas) and 2 long weekends (MLK Jr. and President's Day). A few years ago, I asked a handful of the more athletic girls at my school why they don't play basketball, and they cited the length of the season as their main objection. I mentioned how long the HS volleyball season is, and they didn't mind it because of how much of the pre-competition activities take place before the school year starts. They come in and practice for a couple hours in the morning and then go back to enjoying their summer.

This year is the 2nd time in 7 years that my school is not fielding a JV girls basketball team. Only 12 girls came out to play this year.
Click to expand...
I'd actually like to see high school basketball compact their season, more games, less practices. I really think that would help interest. College / NBA teams play 3-4 games a week, let's do that in high school. We currently have a 22 games season that stretches over 3 1/2 months. Some weeks you play one game per week. I'd do like Girls Mon/ Wed/ Fri, Boys Tue/ Thur/ Sat. You do 3 games a week most weeks a few 2 games per week and you could knock out the season in 2 1/2 months. Throw in a week off at the holiday's, I don't care. Kids don't like to practice!

PS, funny part about your post is for most of these kids, they'll be working jobs where they work over the holidays and said long weekends. 😂
 
I don't want to place too much blame on the coaches but one thing I have seen across many sports is coaches focusing on talented players only.

In football, it is common to see a coach "recruiting the hallways" for more players. In some sports, and definitely girls basketball, the only time I see a hard recruiting effort by a coach is to find enough players to field a JV team. If they have enough players, they don't really care.

I've commented in the past about one of the best coaches I've seen took over a girls tennis team that had 8 players. Over the next several years, they have routinely had 25+ players. There isn't enough spots in tennis for 25+ players but he makes it work by rotating players and getting a full JV season. He is committed to all of his players.

I watched a girls HS basketball coach late in the season call a talented Freshman JV player away from her friends and tell her that she "HAD to come back next year". Her two teammates stood 5 feet away and wondered why the coach didn't tell them that they "HAD to come back next season" too. They didn't. Now that school is begging for players.
 
14Red said:
I'd actually like to see high school basketball compact their season, more games, less practices. I really think that would help interest. College / NBA teams play 3-4 games a week, let's do that in high school. We currently have a 22 games season that stretches over 3 1/2 months. Some weeks you play one game per week. I'd do like Girls Mon/ Wed/ Fri, Boys Tue/ Thur/ Sat. You do 3 games a week most weeks a few 2 games per week and you could knock out the season in 2 1/2 months. Throw in a week off at the holiday's, I don't care. Kids don't like to practice!

PS, funny part about your post is for most of these kids, they'll be working jobs where they work over the holidays and said long weekends. 😂
Click to expand...
I just made an account to say I love this idea so much. No games until after thanksgiving weekend so fall sport kids have more time to recover, mandatory dead period Christmas Eve- New Years Day. Move the tournament 1 week early so there’s a longer break between AAU and/or spring sports. Kids play 4-6 AAU games over a weekend, they should be able to play 3 games over a whole week. Less player and coach burnout.
 
Here from NW Ohio, our conferences two biggest schools do not have enough girls for a JV program. Doing the math, I'd say grades 9-12, the schools have over 200 girls, and you can't get 15 girls out? And these are historically pretty good programs, has been at the state level in the past decade. Really sad.
 
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