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League Leadership

February 15, 2014

This past Wednesday, we convened for the 28th year the leadership of the various high school leagues and conferences across Michigan. Our purpose is to provide a “heads-up” and stimulate feedback on many of the proposals heading to the MHSAA Representative Council in March or May. 

Each of the substantive changes in Handbook regulations is presented. Every MHSAA committee recommendation to the Council is detailed.

This year’s higher profile topics are proposed changes in undue influence penalties, international student eligibility requirements, increasing requirements for coaches, new football practice policies to improve acclimatization and reduce head contact, and enhanced standards for officials assigners. A progress report on a year-long look at junior high/middle school policies was provided, and the athletic related transfer rule that takes full effect in August was reviewed.

The MHSAA asks the league leaders to provide written and/or oral reports to their league members and to relay reactions to MHSAA staff prior to the Council’s March and May meetings.

Of course, what we’re asking is a very small part of the important role that leagues and conferences have in the life of school sports. For most schools, leagues provide the core schedule for regular-season contests. They nurture healthy local rivalries in a competitive arena and provide opportunities for students to interact outside the arena during programs that promote student leadership and sportsmanship.

A Dedicated Downtime

November 7, 2014

Those who administer, coach or play school sports have become familiar with the phrase “downtime” to describe that period just before a season when coaches are not allowed to assemble players for activities that look too much like practice being conducted before the earliest practice of the season is allowed by rule.

In school sports, therefore, we often consider the downtime as a time to do less as teams – less than during the season, and even less than what is allowed teams during most of the offseason. If student-athletes are going to prepare for the upcoming season, they do so more as individuals than as organized teams during the brief preseason downtime.

In this we might look to the arts and literature for assistance; for it is in the downtime – the time away, on one’s own – that many artists, writers and other creative types have found their inspiration for excellence.

In Daily Rituals: How Artists Work, author Mason Currey describes the working habits of 160 creative thinkers. A common theme is the time these people demanded to be away from others to walk, sit and ponder. To wonder. To work through obstacles that seemed to be blocking their progress.

This is an imperfect analogy for student-athletes and school coaches, but it’s still instructive. In fact, a disconnected downtime – one without television, texting, tweeting and team drills, but with time and space to earnestly assess strengths and address weaknesses – might be central to an effective prescription for the upcoming season.