Classes Still Create Hoosier Hysteria
July 27, 2017
By Rob Kaminski
MHSAA benchmarks editor
This is the fourth part in a series on MHSAA tournament classification, past and present, that will be published over the next two weeks. This series originally ran in this spring's edition of MHSAA benchmarks.
Twenty years ago, Bloomington North High School won the Indiana High School Athletic Association boys basketball championship, defeating Delta 75-54 at the RCA Dome in Indianapolis.
The date, March 22, 1997, is at the same time revered and disdained by traditionalists in the state who saw it as the last schoolboy championship game the state would ever host.
That’s how devout the game of basketball, particularly interscholastic basketball, had become in the Hoosier state during the 87 years a state champion – one state champion, to be precise – was crowned.
Following that 1997 season, the IHSAA moved to a four-class system for its roundball tournaments, like so many of its state association counterparts had done years earlier.
It would be shocking to find more than a small percentage of current high school basketball players around the country unfamiliar with the iconic movie Hoosiers, even though the film is now more than 30 years old.
And, the storyline for that blockbuster unfolded more than 30 years prior to its release, when small-town, undermanned Milan High School defeated Muncie Central High School 32-30 in the 1954 IHSAA title game.
Perhaps it’s because of the David vs Goliath notion, or the fame of the movie that replaced Milan with the fictional Hickory and real-life star Bobby Plump with Hollywood hero Jimmy Chitwood, or the simple fact that Indiana had something other states didn’t.
Whatever the reason, plenty of opposition remains to this day to basketball classification in the state.
The fact is, the small rural schools were regularly being beaten handily by the much larger suburban and city schools as the tournament progressed each season.
Small schools also were closing at a rapid rate following the state’s School Reorganization Act in 1959, as students converged on larger, centralized county schools. From 1960 to 2000, the number of schools entering the tournament dropped from 694 to 381, and in 1997 a total of 382 schools and 4,584 athletes began competition at the Sectional level (the first level of the IHSAA Basketball Tournament).
It was at the entry level of the tournament where school administrators felt the pain of the new class system, but not necessarily for the same nostalgic reasons as the fans who either attended or boycotted the tournament.
At the Sectional round of the tournament, the IHSAA was culling just 2 percent of the revenue, with the participating schools splitting the balance. So, when Sectional attendance dropped by 14 percent in that first year of class basketball, many schools realized a financial loss. It was money they had grown to count on in prior years to help fund various aspects of the department.
Schools cumulatively received more than $900,000 from Sectional competition in 1998, but that total was down from more than $1 million in the last year of the single-class tournament.
Yet, the current format provides a great deal more opportunity and realistic chances at championship runs for schools of all enrollments.
To date, 60 additional teams have championship or runner-up trophies on display in school trophy cases around Indiana.
That was the mission in front of then-IHSAA commissioner Bob Gardner (now National Federation executive director) once the board made its decision: to give thousands more student-athletes the opportunity for once-in-a-lifetime experiences.
As any statistician knows, figures can be manipulated to tell any side of a story. Declining attendance in year one of class basketball is such a number.
The truth is tournament attendance had been on a steady downward spiral since its peak of just over 1.5 million in 1962. By the last single-class event in 1997, the total attendance was half that.
The challenge then and today, as it is for all state associations, is to find that delicate balance for those holding onto tradition, those holding onto trophies, and the number of trophies to hand out.
Editor’s Note: Stories from the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette in 1998 and from a 2007 issue of Indianapolis Monthly provided facts in this article.
Preparation Pays Off as Janczarek Caps Lake Orion Career with Best Finals Finish
By
Keith Dunlap
Special for MHSAA.com
March 13, 2025
The recent stretch of warm weather might have melted snow and ice and indicated ski season is over, but don’t tell that to Broden Janczarek.
Since he left the Division 1 Finals on Feb. 24 at Nub’s Nob, the senior from Lake Orion has been his usual busy self.
He has been to training and racing sessions in Oregon, Colorado, and Canada, adding to his world skiing travels.
Janczarek said the highlight came last summer, when he traveled to Chile (during its winter) to enjoy two weeks of breathtaking scenery, food that was cooked by chefs each day and skiing.
“We were staying right at the base of the mountain,” he said. “We were walking out of our little condo, skiing open to close and then starting right back over the next day.”
While his experiences skiing around the world and on junior circuits are near and dear to him, so is his experience skiing for the high school team, which was beyond fruitful.
During his time in high school, Janczarek:
- Won the Southeast Michigan Ski League giant slalom and slalom titles last year, and the slalom this year. He was second in giant slalom this season.
- Qualified for the MHSAA Division 1 Finals all four years. (This season the Dragons qualified as a team as well.)
- Posted three top-10 finishes at the Finals, including a runner-up in giant slalom this season.
- Accumulated a 4.0 grade-point average in the classroom.
Then again, competing as a skier from Southeast Michigan and nearly beating elite skiers from the Upper Peninsula and the northern part of the Lower Peninsula shouldn’t have been much of a surprise, since he has done it for years at weekend junior competitions.
“It was nice to kind of show them what’s going on in Southeast Michigan,” Janczarek said.
Janczarek said his love for skiing started early in life, beginning when his dad taught him the sport at age 3. He got serious into racing when he was 7, and by the time he got into high school he was already accomplished, having trained with Pinnacle Alpine Racing based out of Pine Knob.
He said there were two big components that drew him most to the sport.
“Partially the adrenaline rush of racing, but also the community,” he said. “You wouldn’t realize it with skiing because it’s more of a solo sport. But the team bonding you make and the close friendships you have, it can make or break your experiences in the sport. I was fortunate to have some good teammates, some good friends and even better coaches along the way.”
Lake Orion head coach Karl Basigkow said the biggest thing that has separated Janczarek from the rest is the way he prepares for different tracks, gate placement and terrains each course has presented.
“He’s a student of the sport,” Basigkow said. “His technique is excellent. Every race course and venue is different, and with that in mind the tactical side is always in development.”
What also has complemented Janczarek on the slopes has been his time on the pitch as a soccer player.
He played soccer at Lake Orion for all four years of high school primary as a center back, which he said gave him extra cardiovascular endurance for ski races. In turn, he said skiing and all the concentration that sport forces an athlete to develop have helped him be a better soccer player.
“If I had just done one over the other, I wouldn’t have been a better athlete for it,” he said.
At the Finals, while the biggest accomplishment was finishing second in the giant slalom — which was his best finish at a high school state meet — the biggest compliment to him might have been how he handled one mishap in the slalom.
Janczarek had a straddle on the first run of slalom that pretty much took him out of the competition, but he didn’t hesitate to go up for his second run and finish.
“I know there is a lot of people in the sport of ski racing that if they have a bad run, they’ll just not take their second run or just leave and go home,” he said. “I think it’s important you give your all every time you’re on the ski hill.”
Janczarek will continue to give it his all in college, as he plans to ski for Northern Michigan University.
He said he wants to stick with skiing “as far as it will take him,” whether it’s something beyond college competitively, or just as a coach to influence others.
Basigkow said Janczarek was generous with his time all season in the way he counseled younger skiers on Lake Orion’s team, and saw firsthand how coaching could be in his future.
“Just to get other people the same love for the sport I have,” Janczarek said.
Keith Dunlap has served in Detroit-area sports media for more than two decades, including as a sportswriter at the Oakland Press from 2001-16 primarily covering high school sports but also college and professional teams. His bylines also have appeared in USA Today, the Washington Post, the Detroit Free Press, the Houston Chronicle and the Boston Globe. He served as the administrator for the Oakland Activities Association’s website from 2017-2020. Contact him at [email protected] with story ideas for Oakland, Macomb and Wayne counties.
PHOTOS (Top) Lake Orion's Broden Janczarek cuts past a gate during a slalom run at the Division 1 Finals at Nub's Nob. (Middle) Janczarek comes to a stop after a giant slalom run. (Click for more by Tori Burley.)