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WPIAL conference idea

Sean Miller Fan said:
They have no issue with 6 champions. You can still have your 6 champions AND have a better regular season.
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They've been down the road. 90% of the schools want to compete with schools of thei respective size. They literally polled the coaches and AD's last year.

10-15 minutes extra travel time isn't really that big of an issue for competitive balance.

The schools in a bind are schools like Woody High. They're a 3A school and if they decide to play 3A, they're going to more then likely lose Penn Hills, Gateway, PCC, etc from their schedule. They already have dwindling attendance. Do Woody High fans want to be playing Brentwood, Elizabeth Forward, Keystone Oaks, etc???
 
Sean Miller Fan said:
you allow the schools to create their own conferences much like the NCAA does
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I keep telling you, they are allowed to make their own conferences, the PIAA has no jurisdiction over conference play. WPIAL schools for the most part are already doing what they want to do.
 
recruitsreadtheseboards said:
What rural kids don't play hockey? Ever see Canada? Minnesota?
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Everyone plays hockey in Canada so you cant compare that. Its the national sport. As for Minnesota, its ingrained in the state's culture BUT I would bet you the suburban schools have much higher hockey participation than the rural ones.
 
steelcurtain55. said:
They've been down the road. 90% of the schools want to compete with schools of thei respective size. They literally polled the coaches and AD's last year.

10-15 minutes extra travel time isn't really that big of an issue for competitive balance.

The schools in a bind are schools like Woody High. They're a 3A school and if they decide to play 3A, they're going to more then likely lose Penn Hills, Gateway, PCC, etc from their schedule. They already have dwindling attendance. Do Woody High fans want to be playing Brentwood, Elizabeth Forward, Keystone Oaks, etc???
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what's going on with Woodland Hills? It doesnt seem that long ago that they were a perennial powerhouse in the highest classification. it was only 4 divisions but still. they were beating gateway annually and playing for WPIAL championships.
 
YourPittDanceTeam said:
Can't disagree any more with your suggestion. Conferences should be based upon two points, class size and geography. Allowing AD involvement would be one of the worst things that you can do. The AD's would look to their school board for guidance and with the school board being involved, you have mommy and daddy issues.
Check out the PIHL to see how this kind of a set up has worked? A school like Latrobe has played at a lower level then the size of their school district implies they should compete. They have been a AA team for years and they should have played at the AAA level. Why? They wanted to win games and banners. They did this while schools like GCC and Bishop Canevin with much smaller enrollment when compared to Latrobe, played at the same AA level. Why? Because those parents wanted their kids to be challenged and play the sport without worrying about wins and banners.
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YourPittDanceTeam said:
Latrobe had then and continues to have now, more hockey players in their hockey organization then GCC and Bishop Canevin had added together. Latrobe is not the only school that does that. I know that Norwin (a school with similar enrollment numbers to Latrobe) plays at the Class A level because the parents that I know told me that they don't feel their players are as good as teams like Latrobe, Penn Trafford, Franklin Regional, Mars, etc... . I always laugh and tell them, should a team like the Pirates say that we know we aren't going to be very goof this year, play at a lower level, say Minor League AA level until the coaches feel they are good enough? I say, play your ganes against schools of equal size and if you suck, focus on getting better, not running away from the competition.
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Thoughts about your PIHL (high school hockey in western PA.) comments ......

- The PIHL has for a long time had a Competition Initiative where they try to organize divisions of hockey so that the competition is as fair and competitive as possible ...... obviously nothing is perfect but they try to sort teams and make divisions based on the sum of BOTH current enrollment and a rolling 4 years of weighted winning percentages to come up with a point total for each school and make their Divisions based on those point totals ....... so for each of the last 4 years they multiple a teams winning % in league games for that year times a weighted factor (x1000 if they played in AAA, x600 if they played in AA, and x360 if they played in A) and they add those points together for all 4 years and then add the schools enrollment to that (enrollment numbers are the exact same as the WPIAL uses) to get a TOTAL POINT SCORE for each school.

- The Divisions in the PIHL are AAA, AA, A, and D2 (D2 are developing teams or teams that just don't have enough good players to compete in the other divisions ..... D2 doesn't compete in State Playoffs) ...... the 11 schools with the top total points make up AAA, the next 11 teams in point total make up AA, the next 23 teams in point total are A (there are two A divisions with 11 teams in one and 12 teams in the other) ..... D2 has 12 teams ( two divisions of 6 teams) ....... the reason that they like 11 team divisions are that 20 league games are played and so in an 11 team division you can play the other 10 teams twice (home and away).

- Each year based on enrollment and the rolling 4 year weighted winning % point totals, a few teams change divisions (up or down).

- Latrobe played in the 11 team AA division again last season based on their point total which was 16th in the PIHL meaning they were 5th in point total among AA teams ...... also, of the 11 AA teams, 8 had a larger school enrollment then Latrobe meaning Latrobe was actually the 3rd smallest school in their division ...... there are many schools larger than Latrobe that play in a lower division (A or D2) because they can't compete in the higher divisions.

- Greensburg-Salem has a hockey team that played in the A division but I don't see a team from GCC.

- Bishop Canevin played in the D2 division last year not AA ..... Bishop McCort from Johnstown played in AA and they are a small Catholic school but with a rich hockey tradition including multiple state championships in the past ..... they get a lot of the better hockey players from the greater Johnstown area so they are a school with a small enrollment who can compete against bigger schools.

- The PIHL does a pretty good job of keeping the divisions competitive in western PA high school hockey.
 
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Sean Miller Fan said:
No. I like grouping regular seasons by competitiveness. If Norwin hockey sucks, I am fine with letting them play 1A in the regular season. But they cant participate in the 1A tournament because their potential player pool (ie enrollment) is too large. Now, lets say they go .500 in 1A, then I would allow the 1A schools to vote them in the playoffs if they wanted.

I actually like what hockey does. Again, not super familiar with it but I have noticed schools of different sizes playing together and I figured it was somewhat merit based. Sort of like promotion/relegation in soccer. If Norwin wins the 1A Championship, they would be asked to moved to 2A. If USC goes winless 2 years in a row, they would probably drop down. This is as good as it gets, really.
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Not really feasible. The involvement of parents into the decision making process will screw everything up. I can just hear little Jimmy's mommy saying that if her son isn't playing AA hockey this year, then he's not playing.
By the way, would it be okay for Pitt to say, next year we aren't going to be very good, so we are going to move down to play in the PSAC for a year?
 
YourPittDanceTeam said:
Not really feasible. The involvement of parents into the decision making process will screw everything up. I can just hear little Jimmy's mommy saying that if her son isn't playing AA hockey this year, then he's not playing.
By the way, would it be okay for Pitt to say, next year we aren't going to be very good, so we are going to move down to play in the PSAC for a year?
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It's not deciding based on wanting to play down, it's more of the teams going winless for two straight years and getting relegating to the lower division. Championship-level teams would get promoted all based on two-year cycles just like they do now with enrollment.
 
Burgh15 said:
It's not deciding based on wanting to play down, it's more of the teams going winless for two straight years and getting relegating to the lower division. Championship-level teams would get promoted all based on two-year cycles just like they do now with enrollment.
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I have hands on knowledge of at least three schools in the PIHL that have chosen to play at a lower level. I can't say who or how, but I know. For me, it diminishes the integrity of the sport. No more then the local PAHL teams that "sandbag" during games to get place at a lower level.
 
YourPittDanceTeam said:
I have hands on knowledge of at least three schools in the PIHL that have chosen to play at a lower level. I can't say who or how, but I know. For me, it diminishes the integrity of the sport. No more then the local PAHL teams that "sandbag" during games to get place at a lower level.
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I wasn't talking about the PIHL but rather SMF's premise that a football team's on-field performance would result in a demotion or promotion.
 
Zeldas Open Roof said:
what's going on with Woodland Hills? It doesnt seem that long ago that they were a perennial powerhouse in the highest classification. it was only 4 divisions but still. they were beating gateway annually and playing for WPIAL championships.
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Westinghouse left Churchill about twenty years ago and took thousands of jobs with it. The effects of that are really evident nowadays.
 
goalieman said:
Thoughts about your PIHL (high school hockey in western PA.) comments ......

- The PIHL has for a long time had a Competition Initiative where they try to organize divisions of hockey so that the competition is as fair and competitive as possible ...... obviously nothing is perfect but they try to sort teams and make divisions based on the sum of BOTH current enrollment and a rolling 4 years of weighted winning percentages to come up with a point total for each school and make their Divisions based on those point totals ....... so for each of the last 4 years they multiple a teams winning % in league games for that year times a weighted factor (x1000 if they played in AAA, x600 if they played in AA, and x360 if they played in A) and they add those points together for all 4 years and then add the schools enrollment to that (enrollment numbers are the exact same as the WPIAL uses) to get a TOTAL POINT SCORE for each school.

- The Divisions in the PIHL are AAA, AA, A, and D2 (D2 are developing teams or teams that just don't have enough good players to compete in the other divisions ..... D2 doesn't compete in State Playoffs) ...... the 11 schools with the top total points make up AAA, the next 11 teams in point total make up AA, the next 23 teams in point total are A (there are two A divisions with 11 teams in one and 12 teams in the other) ..... D2 has 12 teams ( two divisions of 6 teams) ....... the reason that they like 11 team divisions are that 20 league games are played and so in an 11 team division you can play the other 10 teams twice (home and away).

- Each year based on enrollment and the rolling 4 year weighted winning % point totals, a few teams change divisions (up or down).

- Latrobe played in the 11 team AA division again last season based on their point total which was 16th in the PIHL meaning they were 5th in point total among AA teams ...... also, of the 11 AA teams, 8 had a larger school enrollment then Latrobe meaning Latrobe was actually the 3rd smallest school in their division ...... there are many schools larger than Latrobe that play in a lower division (A or D2) because they can't compete in the higher divisions.

- Greensburg-Salem has a hockey team that played in the A division but I don't see a team from GCC.

- Bishop Canevin played in the D2 division last year not AA ..... Bishop McCort from Johnstown played in AA and they are a small Catholic school but with a rich hockey tradition including multiple state championships in the past ..... they get a lot of the better hockey players from the greater Johnstown area so they are a school with a small enrollment who can compete against bigger schools.

- The PIHL does a pretty good job of keeping the divisions competitive in western PA high school hockey.
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This sounds so perfect. How can hockey get it right but WPIAL football is a mess?
 
Burgh15 said:
I wasn't talking about the PIHL but rather SMF's premise that a football team's on-field performance would result in a demotion or promotion.
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The football people need to talk to the hockey people because those guys are living right. In my previous 3A example, South Allegheny should be playing 1A. Belle Vernon should be playing 5A. Instead they will play each other in a complete waste of time game for everyone. What good is that game doing for anyone? Let hockey run football.
 
Zeldas Open Roof said:
i dont think this is true. current male enrollment has them at 5a..
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They are 3A for the current cycle. Maybe their enrollment today is 5A but for the current cycle which was counted last year or the year before, its 3A. I think they lost more than most to the cyber and charter schools during Covid and they didnt come back
 
Sean Miller Fan said:
They are 3A for the current cycle. Maybe their enrollment today is 5A but for the current cycle which was counted last year or the year before, its 3A. I think they lost more than most to the cyber and charter schools during Covid and they didnt come back
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These are all the teams that voluntarily played up in football.

Woodland Hills 5A
Seton LaSalle 3A
Serra Catholic 2A

Woodland Hills wanted the geographic rivals and to increase attendance compared to a 3A section.
 
Burgh15 said:
These are all the teams that voluntarily played up in football.

Woodland Hills 5A
Seton LaSalle 3A
Serra Catholic 2A

Woodland Hills wanted the geographic rivals and to increase attendance compared to a 3A section.
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Aliquippa too. I think they opted to play up one or two classifications then had to play up another one due to a wpial rule about being good and having a certain amount of transfers on your roster or something like that.
 
Burgh15 said:
These are all the teams that voluntarily played up in football.

Woodland Hills 5A
Seton LaSalle 3A
Serra Catholic 2A

Woodland Hills wanted the geographic rivals and to increase attendance compared to a 3A section.
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I dont blame WH for doing that but this is an example of what I am talking about. There shouldn't be a thing of "playing up." Play those teams in the regular season and then they should be eligible for the 3A playoffs. My guess is they would have a legit chance to win 3A but they gave up a shot at the WPIAL championship to play rivals. Shouldn't be an either/or.
 
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Parkview57 said:
Wow. I was unaware of those numbers, Grandson is 6 and goes over to RMU to play.
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I was surprised by that too. Way more than I would have thought but this is one of the best hockey areas. I am giving the WPIHL the annual SMF Foundation Award for Ingenuity. The way they organize their divisions is unbelievably good. The gym teacher football coaches think its a fantastic idea to travel 40 miles for a 50 point beat down because that school has 8 more boys in grades 10-12 instead of losing by 50 by the next town over that has 80 more boys. Total idiots.
 
Sean Miller Fan said:
Butler proposing relegation. I like it. Should be like how the PIHL does it.

www.post-gazette.com

Dropping a class: Butler presents PIAA with idea where struggling teams can move down in classification

PIAA will further discuss proposal in January.
www.post-gazette.com www.post-gazette.com
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Hockey is different. Much more income based than traditional HS sports and a lot of schools really don't support the programs. You could have a big school with just mild interest because they're thirty miles from a rink.

Really don't like this idea because a school moving down could push another school up since the PIAA typically sets classifications based on balancing the number of schools in the smaller classifications. Would give a bigger school license to to sit back and wait to see if they can build their program until it's had some success to invest in it. We know that private schools tend to monkey with their enrollment to get into a certain classification and people complain about it all the time. There also isn't anywhere to go if you're a single A school that's doing its best to hold a program together but now you've got to play a AA school with five times, or more, the enrollment because it was too hard for them in AA. Just a dumb idea for most sports and it really doesn't guarantee it makes things any better.
 
Sean Miller Fan said:
We are a few weeks away from blowout football season, teams traveling 50 miles to lose 60-0 when they could have done that the next town over. So, here's my idea:

Let the AD's make their own conferences. Mandate that each conference have 8 teams. Doesn't matter what classification you are in. If a 3A school wants to play with 6A schools and those schools want them in their conference, then do it. The goal should be competitive balance.

Here's an example. Instead of Belle Vernon killing everyone in Westmoreland County and Uniontown having to go independent, maybe Belle Vernon joins a conference with TJ, Peters, USC, CM, BP, SF, CV, and Lebo. Maybe Uniontown joins a conference with Brownsville, AG, Frazier, Mapletown, Waynesburg, Geibel, Carmichaels

Then the WPIAL schedules 2 non-conference games which are important factors for playoff consideration so these must be teams in your classification. So maybe Uniontown goes 7-0 in their section and BV goes 2-5 in theirs, BV would possibly win their 2 non-conference games while Uniontown loses to say EF and West Mifflin and gets a 3A playoff bid over Uniontown.

The goal of all this is to minimize blowouts and allowing teams to play nearby rivals regardless of class.
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So a 2A school near Pitt central catholic should play each other and you don’t see a blow out game, really?
 
I like the idea of 5 classifications and private/charter schools that annually demolish their opponents must play up 1-2 levels.
 
Sean Miller Fan said:
Butler proposing relegation. I like it. Should be like how the PIHL does it.

www.post-gazette.com

Dropping a class: Butler presents PIAA with idea where struggling teams can move down in classification

PIAA will further discuss proposal in January.
www.post-gazette.com www.post-gazette.com
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Absolutely not. The PIHL has way to many mommy's and daddy's involved in running the league and the teams themselves. The PIHL organization move up or down a level based upon the judgement of the parents running the organizations. If they feel their team is not very good then they play a down a level for a couple of years until they feel the program is competitive. That is a nonsense. Every team should play at the level that the state governing body determines them to be at based upon the number of students at that school.
Should Pitt petition the NCAA to allow it to play football next year as a FCS team because the school has determined that they will suck again next year? I mean, using your PIHL suggestion, they should be able to do so to protect the players on the team from the physical and emotional harm done by being on a losing team. Sorry, no.
 
YourPittDanceTeam said:
Absolutely not. The PIHL has way to many mommy's and daddy's involved in running the league and the teams themselves. The PIHL organization move up or down a level based upon the judgement of the parents running the organizations. If they feel their team is not very good then they play a down a level for a couple of years until they feel the program is competitive. That is a nonsense. Every team should play at the level that the state governing body determines them to be at based upon the number of students at that school.
Should Pitt petition the NCAA to allow it to play football next year as a FCS team because the school has determined that they will suck again next year? I mean, using your PIHL suggestion, they should be able to do so to protect the players on the team from the physical and emotional harm done by being on a losing team. Sorry, no.
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Yes, Pitt playing at FCS for the next few years would probably be a good idea. Its going to take awhile to recover from this Majors 2 level
 
Cap pitt said:
So a 2A school near Pitt central catholic should play each other and you don’t see a blow out game, really?
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That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying if there was a great 2A school that felt it can compete with CC and CC felt that program was worthy of being in their league, those schools can create their own league together. It should be based both on geography and competitivenss. Enrollment size shouldn't factor in as much. Butler is 6A. They should be in a league with 3A schools like Freeport, Deer Lakes, etc. Make them ineligible for the PIAA playoffs. If they beat Freeport in the 3A WPIAL Championship, Freeport still moves on.
 
Sean Miller Fan said:
That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying if there was a great 2A school that felt it can compete with CC and CC felt that program was worthy of being in their league, those schools can create their own league together. It should be based both on geography and competitivenss. Enrollment size shouldn't factor in as much. Butler is 6A. They should be in a league with 3A schools like Freeport, Deer Lakes, etc. Make them ineligible for the PIAA playoffs. If they beat Freeport in the 3A WPIAL Championship, Freeport still moves on.
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Aren't you the same guy that thinks Altoona is silly for not wanting to drive three hours to play football games?
 
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