Highlight Reel: Everett/Flushing
November 5, 2014
The Flushing football team defeated Lansing Everett on Saturday in a Division 2 District opener. Click the headings below for MHSAA.tv highlights and the final link to watch the game in full.
EVERETT TIES IT - Rhett Blackman ties the game up for Lansing Everett against Flushing in the second quarter on a 6-yard run. Blackman would score twice.
WOW FACTOR - Flushing's Jake Matus takes in a 59-yard touchdown pass from quarterback Garrett Oginsky on the last play of the first half to break that tie.
BIG PASS FOR VIKINGS - Everett tightens things up late in the third quarter on this 50-yard pass and run play from Rhett Butler to Brian Jones. It cut the Flushing lead to 29-21 at the time, and that score held up.
Watch the entire game and order DVDs by Clicking Here.
Eight-Player Options
March 10, 2017
Put this in the category of “No good deed goes unpunished.”
In 2011, the MHSAA provided an additional playoff for Class D schools sponsoring 8-player football. This helped save football in some schools and helped return the game of football to other schools. But now that the number of 8-player programs has expanded from two dozen in 2011 to more than 60, there are complaints:
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Some complaints come out of a sense of entitlement that all final games in both the 8-player and 11-player tournament deserve to be played at Ford Field.
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Some complaints come from Class C schools whose enrollments are too large for the 8-player tournament. Class C schools which sponsor the 8-player game have no tournament at all in which to play, regardless of where the finals might be held.
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Some complaints come from Class D schools which protest any suggestion that Class C schools – even the smallest – be allowed to play in the 8-player tournament.
There are now three scenarios emerging as the most likely future for 8-player football:
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The original plan ... A five-week, 32-team tournament for Class D schools only, with the finals at a site to be determined, but probably not Ford Field.
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Alternative #1 ... Reduce the 11-player tournament to seven divisions and make Division 8 the 8-player tournament with 32 Class D teams in a five-week tournament, ending at Ford Field.
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Alternative #2 ... Conduct the 8-player tournament in two divisions of 16 Class D teams, competing in a four-week playoff ending in a double-header at the Superior Dome on the Saturday before Thanksgiving.
The pros and cons of these options are being widely discussed. Sometimes the discussions have a tone that is critical of the MHSAA, which comes from those who forget that it was the MHSAA itself which moved in 2011 to protect and promote football by adding the 8-player playoff tournament option for its smallest member schools. That Class D schools now feel entitled to the Ford Field opportunity and Class C schools want access to an 8-player tournament is not unexpected; but criticism of the MHSAA’s efforts is not deserved.