Logo

Inglis Finds Next Home at MHSAA

December 4, 2013

By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor

The theme chosen by Portage Northern’s student section for its hockey Regional Final in 1989 was “Kings of the Ice,” and as such they wore Burger King crowns as a sign of the royalty their classmates soon would earn.  

Just before team captain Cody Inglis accepted the championship trophy, he skated to his friends and was anointed as well as one placed a crown upon his head.

Golden cardboard and all, Inglis received his team’s prize and circled the ice.

Inglis returned home that night eager to discuss the highlights with his dad Bill, a former professional player and one-time coach of the NHL’s Buffalo Sabres. But there was only one thing Bill had to say – and it’s a principle that’s continued to guide Cody throughout his career in high school athletics.

“I was really looking for his input and congratulations, and he looked at me and said very succinctly, ‘There’s a right way and a wrong way to do things. And you chose the wrong way,’” Inglis remembered this week. “At the time, I couldn’t see it with the perspective of a 17-year-old kid. But now I look back on it as the most valuable life lesson I’ve ever gotten.

“I knew he was proud of me. But the lesson he was trying to impart on me was doing things the right way is much more important than winning.”

Inglis has been doing things the right way for two decades while serving first at Suttons Bay and then Traverse City Central High School. He’ll bring a winning list of achievements and wealth of knowledge when he joins the Michigan High School Athletic Association staff as an assistant director in January.   

Inglis, 42, has served as athletic director and assistant principal at Traverse City Central since February 2008, taking over after 11 years as athletic director at Suttons Bay. He also has served as secretary for both the Big North and Northwest Conferences and for 13 years as the northern Lower Peninsula representative of 125 athletic directors for the Michigan Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Association.

Inglis will serve as the MHSAA’s director of ice hockey, girls and boys cross country, girls and boys golf, and girls and boys bowling. In addition, he will assist in the direction of girls and boys skiing and girls and boys track and field, and be in charge of the junior high and middle school committee. Inglis also will assist with the administration of the MHSAA’s Coaches Advancement Program and provide his expertise as an instructor.

“We had more than 100 candidates, including a half dozen of the finest ADs in America – not just Michigan. They couldn’t be any better,” MHSAA Executive Director John E. “Jack” Roberts said. “Cody’s selection was based in part on his being just a slightly better fit to the job description we had in mind.

“He’s had to do some tough things as an administrator. But he’s got a personality that causes people to rally around him.”

On the move

Inglis’ dad, Bill, spent 50 years in pro hockey, most of his final 20 as general manager of the Kalamazoo K-Wings, and Cody grew up in lockerrooms around future pros like Ron Hextall, Dirk Graham and Marty Turco. When the Toledo Goaldiggers won the IHL’s Turner Cup when Cody was in sixth grade, he got to carry the cup through downtown. The family moved 17 times, and prior to the stop in Kalamazoo, Cody had never lived anywhere longer than 2½ years.

Inglis graduated from Portage Northern High School in 1989 and went on to Hope College, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in physical education and his teaching certification. He also was the captain of Hope’s 1992 men’s cross country team and captain of the men’s track & field team in both 1992 and 1993, and earned academic All-America honors for cross country.

Given his ties to pro hockey, Inglis might have had an opportunity to follow his dad. But it wasn’t for him. After graduating from Hope, Inglis enrolled at Western Michigan University to study sports management. He went to class for one day and withdrew – his heart just wasn’t into it.

Instead, Inglis hooked up with his Portage Northern cross country coach Bill Fries and found what he did want to do – coach, and in doing so, teach athletics.

The rest is northern Lower Peninsula history.

Inglis hooked on at Suttons Bay as a 23-year physical education teacher and head cross country and track & field coach, and two years later took over the athletic department.

“I was thrown into the fire right away, but I had a desire to be in sports somehow and coaching was a passion of mine,” Inglis said. “It was kinda sink or swim. I realized the craziness and hecticness of it, but it was something I embraced. I was lucky to have the opportunity to do it at Suttons Bay, to grow there and have people who were willing to let me make some mistakes, learn from my mistakes and become a better administrator.”

Inglis has supervised a group of more than 100 coaches while at Traverse City Central, plus a group of more than 20 teachers and staff as part of his assistant principal duties.

He’s managed more than 100 MHSAA Tournaments, including Ski Finals, Football Semifinals and Hockey Quarterfinals, and a variety of lower tournament levels for hockey, wrestling, track and field, cross country, basketball and golf.

His programs have achieved plentiful success under his leadership. Traverse City Central won the Big North Conference all-sport award every year from 2008-12 and earned six MHSAA Finals team championships during his tenure. The varsity programs have produced 34 academic all-state awards over the past three school years – including 14 in 2012-13 – and 62 percent of the student body was involved in athletics last school year.

While at Suttons Bay, Inglis led an athletic program that won the Northwest Conference sportsmanship trophy nine times and earned two MHSAA Finals championships. He also redeveloped athletic boosters programs, oversaw construction projects and was instrumental in the rewriting of athletic policies at both schools. 

He was recognized in the spring with the MHSAA’s Allen W. Bush Award, which recognizes those who serve in high school athletics but do not always receive attention for their contributions.

Mentor to follow

Inglis was instrumental in the creation and later served as an assistant coach for the Traverse City Bay Reps ice hockey team, a co-operative headed by Traverse City St. Francis High School that’s now been in existence 15 seasons. He also was named Division 4 Girls Cross Country Coach of the Year in 2002 by the Michigan Interscholastic Track Coaches Association after leading his team to a runner-up finish at the MHSAA Finals. 

Inglis coached a string of girls cross country teams that made the top 10 at MHSAA Finals five straight seasons, plus 25 all-state athletes in cross country and track and field including three individual MHSAA champions.

He has been a member of seven MHSAA sport committees, including for ice hockey. He’s been a frequent presenter at the MIAAA’s annual conferences, covering topics including fundraising, budgeting, organizing successful tournaments, balancing multiple roles and responsibilities, leadership and technology. He’s also taught MIAAA Leadership Training Courses.

Of little surprise, Inglis has been greatly impacted by growing up following his dad. While mother Jeris was the rock of the family, Bill was Cody’s idol and made a significant impact on the manager Inglis has become.

“My dad was so good at the way he treated people. I just saw how he treated them, whether it was the Zamboni drive or an assistant or secretary, he treated them with so much respect,” Inglis said. “That’s the part I’ve really taken from him, how he treated people and the relationships he made. How you treat people in athletics is so key; they’ll treat you the same way back, I’ve found most of the time.”

Inglis received minor degrees at Hope in business administration and communications, and has completed a number of courses toward a master’s in athletic administration from Ohio University.

He is married to Carrie (Ham) Inglis, an MHSAA Finals cross country individual champion for Big Rapids in 1987. They have three sons.  

PHOTO: (Top) Traverse City Central athletic director Cody Inglis converses with a member of his staff Tuesday. (Middle) Inglis shares a laugh with an official before Tuesday's girls basketball games. (Photos courtesy of Rick Sack.)

Rep Council Wrap-Up: Spring 2015

May 11, 2015

By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor

The Representative Council of the Michigan High School Athletic Association took a number of significant actions during its annual Spring Meeting, May 3-4, in Glen Arbor, highlighted by changes to out-of-season coaching rules, a call for a member vote on a Constitutional amendment affecting middle school and junior high athletics, and initiatives to promote participant health and safety.  

The Spring Meeting of the 19-member legislative body of the Association’s more than 1,400 member schools is generally the busiest of its three sessions each year. The Council considered 13 committee proposals and also dealt with a variety of eligibility rule, postseason tournament and operational issues.

For the past eight months, the MHSAA focused member schools’ attention on an overhaul of out-of-season coaching rules. While support was lacking for a radically different approach, consensus developed for several significant changes within the existing approach for expanding contact between school coaches and their students out-of-season during the school year.

Included in the changes are that coaches will be permitted to work with up to four players in all situations out-of-season during the school year; previously, coaches could work with three or four players, depending on the circumstance. Coaches also will be allowed out of season during the school year to provide coaching in non-school competition to up to four students from that coach’s school. Under this same set of out-of-season coaching rules during the school year, the Council permitted more contact among school coaches and students allowing for previously banned offseason practice rotations to occur. Voluntary workouts out-of-season that involve rotations from conditioning, open gyms, weight lifting and sport-specific skill work may occur so long as there is no more than one four-player station with sport skills being coached. 

Following up on more than a year of consideration by the MHSAA Junior High/Middle School Committee and a Junior High/Middle School Task Force created in December 2013, the Council also approved a request for a membership vote to amend the MHSAA Constitution to allow for school membership beginning at the 6th grade. The membership vote is expected to be conducted in late October; if membership approves the amendment, the Council will consider for which sports 6th-graders will be eligible to compete with and against 7th- and 8th- graders.

The MHSAA’s historical concern for health and safety has been intensified during the past six years of an eight-year campaign focused on “4 H’s” – Health Histories, Heads, Heat and Hearts – and the Council approved several initiatives which continue to improve the environment of school-based sports.

The Council authorized up to three pilot programs to be conducted by volunteer schools, aimed at assisting in decision-making regarding the removal of athletes from activity after possible concussion events as well as in reporting and record-keeping of those events.

The Council mandated that member schools report head injury events through a web-based reporting system the MHSAA is developing. The Council also approved the purchase of another level of insurance aimed at assuring that children of uninsured or underinsured families receive prompt and professional care for suspected head injuries. Both the reporting requirement and the insurance protection are for eligible athletes in all levels of all sports, grades 7 through 12, in both practices and competition.

The Council was briefed on an electronic system that could be used to track pre-participation physical examination forms while improving injury reporting and record-keeping; currently, the MHSAA provides paper forms to member schools at no charge. The Council also was updated on MHSAA plans to provide at no cost to every high school in Michigan the ANYONE CAN SAVE A LIFE – Emergency Action Planning Guide, and informed on the MHSAA’s support of the MI HEARTSafe School initiative of the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, which on May 13 will recognize 128 schools and/or districts for cardiac emergency preparedness.

Here is a summary of other actions taken by the Representative Council at the Spring Meeting, which will take effect during the 2015-16 school year: 

Handbook/Administrative Matters

  • Participation was expanded by the Council for 9th- and 10th-grade transfer students with no history of high school athletic participation who gain immediate subvarsity eligibility through a waiver by the MHSAA Executive Committee. Students who are granted such a waiver may now participate in designated non-scoring subvarsity heats or non-scoring races of varsity individual contests in sports such as swimming and diving, cross country and track and field. Previous to this action, subvarsity eligibility was permitted in subvarsity team sports only or subvarsity-only meets in individual sports. The subvarsity definition also will apply to international students present in the U.S. on an F-1 Visa but not from an MHSAA-approved international student program. 


  • Athletes in ice hockey and boys and girls soccer must compete in four regular-season games against other MHSAA schools to be eligible to compete with their school teams in the MHSAA Tournament. This currently is a requirement in alpine skiing, and a waiver procedure similar to what is utilized in skiing will be developed for hockey and soccer as well.


  • Non-school sports activities coordinated or directed by administrators and parents were added to situations which trigger an athletic link and an extended period of ineligibility for transfer students if those students then enroll at new schools that have association with those administrators or parents. The Council expanded the athletic-related transfer rule which previously involved only non-school coaches and transferring students who do not make a residential change. 

Classification

  • The Council created a “life line” allowance for schools to form a cooperative agreement in excess of the 3,500-student enrollment cap in sports sponsored by fewer than 250 schools. A program may be approved by the Executive Committee for up to three years, if during the previous year, the school or the cooperative program in which the school was a part dropped the sport because of a demonstrated lack of participation. Sports sponsored by 250 or fewer schools during 2014-15 were gymnastics, ice hockey, boys and girls lacrosse, boys and girls alpine skiing and boys and girls swimming and diving. This three-year “life line” allowance is similar to the regulation which allows for a “startup” cooperative program to be created among schools whose combined enrollment exceeds 3,500 students but the schools involved did not sponsor the sport in the previous school year.

Sport Matters

  • For boys and girls basketball, the Council approved an MHSAA Basketball Committee recommendation to seek permission from the National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS) to allow teams to play up to two regular-season games made up of 18-minute halves instead of the current 8-minute quarters. If permission is granted by the NFHS, schools will be required to seek permission from the MHSAA prior to events and provide reports after 36-minute games are played.


  • In bowling, it was announced that Kegel is developing a bowling lane oil pattern for high school bowling called the “Allen Pattern,” named after former MHSAA Assistant Director Randy Allen, who administered the MHSAA bowling program from its inception during the 2003-04 school year until retirement in 2013. Michigan has the largest number of schools in the U.S. sponsoring interscholastic bowling. The Allen Pattern is being designed specifically for the high school level and will be utilized for the 2016 MHSAA Bowling Tournament.


  • In cross country, the MHSAA will appoint and administer a task force of coaches and athletic administrators to address unbalanced Lower Peninsula Cross Country Regionals – including some Regionals having more complete teams in competition than others because teams decide to not compete or cannot compete with a full lineup after Regional groups are drawn. The task force will present its findings to the Council in 2016.


  • For ice hockey, four-person officiating crews were approved for Quarterfinals. The MHSAA began using four-person crews for Semifinals and Finals in 2014.


  • In boys lacrosse, a “play in” game was approved for teams seeded 9-16 in each Regional. Play-in games will be played three days earlier than the traditional start of the MHSAA Tournament, with winners then playing teams seeded 5-8 at the traditional start of tournament play.


  • In wrestling, the Council approved a recommendation by the MHSAA Wrestling Committee that eliminates the second weigh-in at the MHSAA Team Finals. The Friday weigh-in before the start of Quarterfinals will be used for all three rounds of competition during Finals weekend.

The Council also reviewed reports on membership, with 754 senior high schools and 703 junior high/middle schools in 2014-15; eligibility advancement applications, which totaled four for the year; the use of Educational Transfer Forms, which held steady this year; school violations, attendance at athletic director in-service workshops and Coaches Advancement Program sessions, officials’ registrations, rules meetings attendance and officials reports submitted for the past three sports seasons. The Association’s $10.4 million budget for the 2015-16 school year also was approved. 

The Representative Council is the 19-member legislative body of the MHSAA. All but five are elected by member schools. Four members are appointed by the Council to facilitate representation of females and minorities, and the 19th position is occupied by the Superintendent of Public Instruction or designee.

The MHSAA is a private, not-for-profit corporation of voluntary membership by more than 1,400 public and private senior high schools and junior high/middle schools which exists to develop common rules for athletic eligibility and competition. No government funds or tax dollars support the MHSAA, which was the first such association nationally to not accept membership dues or tournament entry fees from schools. Member schools which enforce these rules are permitted to participate in MHSAA tournaments, which attract more than 1.4 million spectators each year.