Stirred not Shaken
Well-known member
Agree
Rumor about 6-7 divisions in basketball
- Thread starter Yappi
- Start date
Unfortunately it looks like a number of vocal schools have the ear of those in charge. Many of them I hear about are small rural schools and D1 schools with less then 550 enrollments. So this could mean that a majority of the schools are okay with the current system.
trojandave
Active member
I'm all for splitting up D1 in basketball and making a 5th division for the super sized schools. Other than D1, there's not that much discrepancy in enrollments. It's not fair to see a school with less than 400 boys having to compete against a school with 800-1200 boys in tournament play.
Getting to the Final 4 in a 5 or 6 division format would still be hard.
Getting to the Final 4 in a 5 or 6 division format would still be hard.
ripvanwinkle
Active member
2 Private. 4 Public. I just brought the state tournament back. And the crowds would be back and roaring... for 2/3 of the games 
I think people need to realize that only 5 play at a time in basketball which tends to "equalize" some of the size disparity noted by several posters when comparing it to the sport of football. They had three divisions (A/AA/AAA) and went to I/II/III/IV. IMO, expanding further is strictly a "money grab" by the OHSAA! Of course, that doesn't address the insidious recruiting issue, so some version of competitive balance formula should be actively considered.
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cincyhoops
Well-known member
Competitive balance is a waste of time. For the amount of time AD's spend tracking and entering the information, there are very few teams moving up/down a division as a result.
I would disagree with very few moving (I guess depends on definition of very few) but agree 100% that it has had zero impact compared to the time it takes administratively.
How would you play a state tournament with 6 divisions? If that happens they will do like football and soccer and only play the 6 finals in the same spot. The semi-finals in each division would be played separately. No way you can fit 24 games in at one facility....unless you start the tourney on Tuesday....which likely isn't going to happen2 Private. 4 Public. I just brought the state tournament back. And the crowds would be back and roaring... for 2/3 of the games
I mentioned this to a local district tournament site manager the other night. Any expansion to more divisions would almost certainly require an extra day and/or a second venue. Assuming that UD will continue to host First Four games...then what do you do? Bring Wright St into the fold? Logistically, this isn't as simple as it sounds.
ripvanwinkle
Active member
In response to both of you, 6 divisions would mean only state final games at Dayton.
Round_Ball_Fan
New member
& in theory, could be played in 1 day. It would be tight and illogical, but never doubt the penny pinchers..
This would be the end of the state tourney. Attendance is awful now If they had 2 games going at the same time at two different locations you would starts seeing games with attendance well under 5,000. It's still crazy to think that there were years at St John Arena where ever game was a sell out and you couldn't touch a scalped ticket for less than $20.....and in the early years of the tourney at the Schott where they regularly got 15,000 plus.
Yappi
Go Buckeyes
Before moving to 6 divisions, I think the OHSAA really needs to consider the reasons why they would want to make this move. Right now, the 4 divisions have blended together in competitiveness. Fixing how divisions are assigned should happen before expanding the number of divisions.
goshengophers
Active member
It's my understanding in talking to a few coaches that the coaches association has been pushing the expansion.
Because in football you need atleast 11 guys on the field at all times. Depth matters more in football than any other sport. Having more boys to pick from matters more when you’re playing a sport that requires more bodies. Basketball on the other hand you only need 5 on the floor and I’ve seen a lot of teams literally use 6 the entire game, a school with 50 boys can compete with a school that has 1000 if they can find 2 or 3 true studs, in football that’s never the case.
Just a year ago Emmanuel Christian could play with nearly any team in Ohio, they don’t even have enough boys to field a football team.
Brecksville's coach just made the case for keeping everything as is while openly arguing for more divisions. He start off by name dropping Avon Football as a reason we need more divisions which is wild because Region 2 would be shakin in their boots if Avon moved up.
“It’s given teams like Avon a chance to compete for the final four. If they were still in Division I, it’s so hard. Yeah, you can spring an upset, but can you spring upset after upset?”
Then we get the usual drivel about running into the privates but this quote just killed me lol: "We also beat Brunswick, which has twice the enrollment as us,” Mehalik said. “When you have special groups, it’s still tough to go up against those big boys. It’s fun, but it’s hard.”
They lost to Ignatius by 3 in OT last year without having to spring a single upset to get there and he is openly fantazing about a Division where his school is the top dog. Alrighty then
“It’s given teams like Avon a chance to compete for the final four. If they were still in Division I, it’s so hard. Yeah, you can spring an upset, but can you spring upset after upset?”
Then we get the usual drivel about running into the privates but this quote just killed me lol: "We also beat Brunswick, which has twice the enrollment as us,” Mehalik said. “When you have special groups, it’s still tough to go up against those big boys. It’s fun, but it’s hard.”
They lost to Ignatius by 3 in OT last year without having to spring a single upset to get there and he is openly fantazing about a Division where his school is the top dog. Alrighty then
I dont care what the understanding is lol they just shouldnt go to 7 divisions because the Brecksvilles of the world cant break through
Has less to do with Brecksville and more to do with these D3, D4 schools mad at schools like Richmond and Lue. Thats the reality of it.
OH_sportsfan
Member
7 is way too many. The only expansion of tournaments I would begrudgingly accept is going to 5 by splitting D1 into two. Would love separate public and private but that will never happen.
You can add in the smaller D1 schools who use the 1,000+ enrollment schools as an excuse for their tournament losses.
Doug Ute is a flat out liar. Yeah, I said it.
We don’t think adding divisions will lead to more revenue for OHSSA. Let’s do some math.
We currently have 4 divisions for basketball. OHSSA keeps all the money made from the regional and state games. These are the best attended games of the tournament. You have 15 regional and state games for each division. We currently have 4 divisions. So OHSSA has 60 games for boys basketball where they get to keep all the profits.
If you go to 6 divisions, they will have 90 games where they get to keep all the profits. Him saying they will not make more money is such a joke. OHSSA is such a joke.
Please don’t say the coaches are pushing it. The football coaches strongly pushed for 12 teams in the playoffs and that was going to happen. Then OHSSA stepped in and made it 16 teams. Why? More money. Basketball coaches pushed for Martin RPI. Then OHSSA switched to MaxPreps. Why? MaxPreps paid them.
I would rather they just require each school to pay an extra $1000 or $2000. If there are 800 schools in Ohio that would be $800,000 or $1,600,000 extra for OHSAA. $1000 from each school would be a fraction of each schools athletic budget. Not easy for some, but OHSSA could have their extra money to take their trips and bloat the staff.
We don’t think adding divisions will lead to more revenue for OHSSA. Let’s do some math.
We currently have 4 divisions for basketball. OHSSA keeps all the money made from the regional and state games. These are the best attended games of the tournament. You have 15 regional and state games for each division. We currently have 4 divisions. So OHSSA has 60 games for boys basketball where they get to keep all the profits.
If you go to 6 divisions, they will have 90 games where they get to keep all the profits. Him saying they will not make more money is such a joke. OHSSA is such a joke.
Please don’t say the coaches are pushing it. The football coaches strongly pushed for 12 teams in the playoffs and that was going to happen. Then OHSSA stepped in and made it 16 teams. Why? More money. Basketball coaches pushed for Martin RPI. Then OHSSA switched to MaxPreps. Why? MaxPreps paid them.
I would rather they just require each school to pay an extra $1000 or $2000. If there are 800 schools in Ohio that would be $800,000 or $1,600,000 extra for OHSAA. $1000 from each school would be a fraction of each schools athletic budget. Not easy for some, but OHSSA could have their extra money to take their trips and bloat the staff.
Yep they are definitely having their say this go around too. Which also makes me think we are probably talking about a done deal already
Think this is a valid "excuse" though. In D1 in Southwest Ohio, we rarely ever see the smaller end of D1 schools make it to Districts. No other division has the gap that D1 has. Over the last 10 years, there has been 6 smaller D1s make it to Districts, with 3 being Wilmington with the Cumberlands.
My suggestion based on 800 boys hoops schools
7 divisions
D1 64 teams
D2 96 teams
D3-7 128 teams (any deviation can result in less teams in D7)
Teams can choose to play up but not choose to play down. If a team chooses to play up, a team drops based on enrollment to keep the numbers even
4 day state tournament at 2 nearby sites for semis doubleheader sessions
D5-7 semis on Thursday
D1-4 semis on Friday
D5-7 finals Friday (one site)
D1-4 finals Saturday (one site)
7 divisions
D1 64 teams
D2 96 teams
D3-7 128 teams (any deviation can result in less teams in D7)
Teams can choose to play up but not choose to play down. If a team chooses to play up, a team drops based on enrollment to keep the numbers even
4 day state tournament at 2 nearby sites for semis doubleheader sessions
D5-7 semis on Thursday
D1-4 semis on Friday
D5-7 finals Friday (one site)
D1-4 finals Saturday (one site)
With this, depending on the location of D1 teams, you could have major travel or teams playing their first game as for a District title. I know football may do this but they play one game a week.