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The Multi-Sport Difference

July 26, 2016

If there was ever a poster child for what it means to be a high school athlete, recent Williamston High School graduate Renee Sturm might be the person to feature. She has said and done exactly what we would hope.

In an era when increasing numbers of high school athletes are graduating midway through their senior year in order to get an early start with the college teams that have recruited them, Renee is a breath of fresh air.

After four years of volleyball and basketball at Williamston High School, Renee just hadn’t had enough of the high school sports experience. So she joined the school’s girls soccer team this past spring.

Now bound for Ferris State University where she is scheduled to play only basketball, Renee had this to say to the Lansing State Journal about why she decided to play soccer to conclude her high school sports career: “I wanted to do something different because playing different sports helps me grow ... I was just hoping to come in and play some.”

She didn’t seek to star, but to play ... to be a part of a different sport and team and group of teammates who would help her develop as an athlete and person.

The richest school sports experience is found in multi-sport participation, both starring and subbing, both losing and winning. That’s what best prepares young people for life.

I suspect this young lady is ready.

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:

  • 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.

  • 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.

  • 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:

  • 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.

  • 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.

  • 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.