Task Force to Promote Multi-Sport Experience
January 14, 2016
By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor
Noting growing concerns for the health risks to young people who specialize too early and narrowly on a single sport, the Michigan High School Athletic Association is creating a task force to work throughout 2016 on promoting the benefits of multi-sport participation.
The task force is expected to develop strategies and tactics for the MHSAA and its member schools to deliver to coaches, athletes and parents that will demonstrate the high risks and limited rewards of early and intense focus on a single sport. A January 2017 campaign launch is anticipated.
The task force will be small in number but consist of both administrators and coaches who represent the diversity of schools and communities in Michigan. Their discussions will be monitored by MHSAA communications staff, who will be designing tactics to implement the ideas and initiatives that the task force discusses.
“For years it seemed educators were alone in promoting the multi-sport experience as the best for young people,” MHSAA Executive Director John E. “Jack” Roberts said. “Rather suddenly, these voices have been joined by high-profile coaches and athletes and supported by a growing body of research.
“Major college football coaches, members of the USA Women’s World Cup Soccer championship team, Hall of Fame pitcher John Smoltz, PGA golfer Jordan Spieth and others demonstrate to us that the multi-sport experience is the healthiest and happiest way to participate in youth sports.”
More than 40 national and international sports organizations have joined a movement called “Project Play” which advocates the multi-sport experience as the safer, healthier and happier sports participation journey. The task force also will benefit from its relationship with the Institute for the Study of Youth Sports at Michigan State University and with Sparrow Health Systems.
“The risks of over-specialization in sports – that is, a focus too early and too intense on a single sport – are greater than all other youth sports health risks combined,” Roberts added. “They need at least as much attention as we’ve brought to reducing the risks of heat stroke, cardiac episodes and concussions.”
Record Girls Tournament Attendance Drives MHSAA Spectatorship Past 1.4 Million Again
By
Geoff Kimmerly
MHSAA.com senior editor
December 18, 2024
A record number of spectators at girls postseason events pushed Michigan High School Athletic Association attendance during the 2023-24 school year past 1.4 million fans for the second straight, with the total of 471,651 spectators for girls competitions breaking the previous all-time best set in 2014-15.
Total, MHSAA tournament events drew 1,449,574 spectators at competitions for which admission is charged – just over a half-percent decrease from 2022-23 but still the second highest overall postseason attendance over the last seven years. Attendance at MHSAA boys tournament events during 2023-24 was 1,008,070, a three-percent decrease from the year before. The MHSAA annually tracks attendance for all sports except golf, skiing and tennis, as single tickets are not sold for those sports.
Record spectator turnout for the Softball and Track & Field Tournaments drove the girls overall increase. Softball set an overall tournament record with 49,636 fans, besting the previous record set just the year before by nearly 2,000, and also set an individual-round record with 4,935 fans at Quarterfinals. Track & Field – with girls and boys competing together – drew a record 42,899 spectators overall, and a Regional record of 25,661. Both track totals bested previous records set during the 2020-21 school year.
Several more sports saw attendance increases during 2023-24. Girls basketball overall postseason attendance was up significantly and for the third-straight year, this time to 158,126 fans for a nine-percent increase from 2022-23. The Individual Wrestling Tournament drew 48,237 fans, an eight-percent increase from the previous season, and set records at the District (13,308) and Regional (11,089) levels. Overall attendance for competitive cheer (29,297, up 12 percent), girls lacrosse (5,627, up six percent), boys lacrosse (17,107, up less than one percent) and boys swimming & diving (6,116, up 33 percent) all were up as well from 2022-23.
Competitive cheer’s increase was keyed in part by record attendance at the District level (14,528). Baseball Districts (36,553), Boys Lacrosse Quarterfinals (3,021) and Girls Diving Regionals (879) also set records.
Football remains the most-attended MHSAA Tournament sport and drew 363,563 spectators for its playoff series – a decrease of nearly five percent from the previous year but including the highest attendance during the Semifinal rounds (32,596) since 2012-13. Boys basketball attendance again ranked second at 280,800 fans, down four percent from the previous year but with increases for the Regional and Quarterfinal rounds. Girls basketball remained third for overall attendance and first among girls sports, followed again by volleyball – which drew 113,239 fans, only 313 fewer than the year before as postseason attendance in that sport has seen less than a percentage point change year to year over the last three seasons.
The MHSAA is a private, not-for-profit corporation of voluntary membership by more than 1,500 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.