New Math: Division & Multiplication Problems
July 25, 2017
By Jack Roberts
MHSAA Executive Director
This is the second 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.
High school tournament classifications went viral before there was social media and most of us knew what “viral” meant.
Much as a virus infects computers today or has created epidemics of disease around the world for centuries, high school tournament classification – once introduced – tends to spread uncontrollably. Once started, it tends to keep expanding and rarely contracts.
While we are still some distance from providing every team a trophy as a result of expanding high school tournament classification across the country, there is criticism nevertheless that we are headed in that direction – a philosophy which is supposed to exist only in local youth sports for our youngest children.
Michigan could be blamed for all this. Michigan is generally accepted as the first state to provide different classifications for season-ending tournaments for different sized schools. It started a century ago. Today, every state has various classifications for its tournaments in most if not all sports. And it is a bit ironic that Michigan – creator of the classification chaos – more than most other states has kept the number of tournament classes or divisions under control.
Yes, there is evidence that tournament classifications have expanded over the years in Michigan, especially with the relatively recent introduction of tournaments in football and the late 1990s’ move from classes to divisions in most MHSAA tournaments. But the MHSAA Representative Council has held true to its word when it expanded the playoffs for football from four classes to eight divisions: this is needed because of unique factors of football, factors that exist in no other sport; and all other sports should be capped at a maximum of four classes or divisions.
Kentucky is the preeminent defender of single-class basketball. All of its 276 high schools compete for the single state championship for each gender. In Indiana, there are still open wounds from its move in 1998 from one to four classes for its 400 schools in basketball.
Multi-class tournaments have tended to increase the number of non-public school champions, which some states are trying to lower through enrollment “multipliers,” and also tend to increase the number of repeat champions, which some states are trying to affect with “success factors” which lift smaller schools into classifications for larger schools if they take home too many trophies.
While there is considerable evidence that state tournaments do as much bad as good for educational athletics, state associations persist in providing postseason tournaments because, on balance, the experiences are supposed to be good for student-athletes. And once we reach that conclusion it is just a small leap to believe that if the tournaments are good for a few, they must be better for more – which leads to creating more and more tournament classifications. One becomes two classes, then three, then four and so forth.
While the argument is that more classifications or divisions provides more students with opportunities to compete and win, it is undeniable that the experience changes as the number of tournament classifications expands. It is not possible for state associations to provide the same level of support when tournament classifications expand to multiple venues playing simultaneously. For example, there is less audio and video broadcast potential at each venue, and less media coverage to each venue. Focus is diluted and fans diminished at each championship.
No one can argue reasonably that today's two-day MHSAA Football Finals of eight championship games has the same pizazz as the one-day, four-games event conducted prior to 1990.
In some states the number of divisions has grown so much that it is difficult to see much difference between the many season-ending state championship games and a regular-season event in the same sport.
It is a balancing act. And Michigan has been studying that balance longer than any other state, and charting a steadier course than most.
Addition by Division
The shift to Divisions for MHSAA Tournament play in numerous sports has added up to a greater number of champions for teams and individuals across the state. Following are the sports currently employing a divisional format, and the procedures for determining enrollment and classification.
In 23 statewide or Lower Peninsula tournaments, schools which sponsor the sport are currently divided into nearly equal divisions. They are:
- Baseball - 4 Divisions
- Boys Bowling - 4 Divisions
- Girls Bowling - 4 Divisions
- Girls Competitive Cheer - 4 Divisions
- LP Boys Cross Country - 4 Divisions
- LP Girls Cross Country - 4 Divisions
- LP Boys Golf - 4 Divisions
- LP Girls Golf - 4 Divisions
- Ice Hockey - 3 Divisions
- Boys Lacrosse - 2 Divisions
- Girls Lacrosse - 2 Divisions
- Boys Skiing - 2 Divisions
- Girls Skiing - 2 Divisions
- LP Boys Soccer - 4 Divisions LP
- Girls Soccer - 4 Divisions
- Girls Softball - 4 Divisions
- LP Boys Swimming & Diving - 3 Divisions
- LP Girls Swimming & Diving - 3 Divisions
- LP Boys Tennis - 4 Divisions
- LP Girls Tennis - 4 Divisions
- LP Boys Track & Field - 4 Divisions
- LP Girls Track & Field - 4 Divisions
- Wrestling - 4 Divisions
Lists of schools for each division of these 23 tournaments are posted on MHSAA.com approximately April 1. Listings of schools in Upper Peninsula tournaments for their sports are also posted on MHSAA.com. The lists are based on school memberships and sports sponsorships in effect or anticipated for the following school year, as known to the MHSAA office as of a date in early March.
In football, the 256 schools which qualify for MHSAA 11-player playoffs are placed in eight equal divisions annually on Selection Sunday. Beginning in 2017, the 8-player divisions will be determined in a like manner on Selection Sunday as well, with 32 qualifying schools placed in two divisions.
Schools have the option to play in any higher division in one or more sports for a minimum of two years.
The deadlines for "opt-ups" are as follows:
- Applications for fall sports must be submitted by April 15
- Applications for winter sports must be submitted by Aug. 15
- Applications for spring sports must be submitted by Oct. 15
Subsequent to the date of these postings for these tournaments, no school will have its division raised or lowered by schools opening or closing, schools adding or dropping sports, schools exercising the option to play in a higher division, or approval or dissolution of cooperative programs.
When the same sport is conducted for boys and girls in the same season (e.g., track & field and cross country), the gender that has the most sponsoring schools controls the division breaks for both genders.
Tradition Continues to Grow as USA Claims Record 9th Softball Finals Title
By
Tom Kendra
Special for MHSAA.com
June 17, 2023
EAST LANSING - Unionville-Sebewaing won its record ninth MHSAA Finals championship – and fourth in a row – on Saturday, but this one might have been the most dramatic.
And most unexpected.
“This one is really special because no one thought we would make it again,” said USA junior left fielder Jenna Gremel, who was the star of the game with a three-run home run in the top of the fourth inning to lift the top-ranked Patriots to a 5-4 win over No. 2 Mendon in the Division 4 championship game at Secchia Stadium.
“We didn’t have a dominant pitcher or a lot of seniors, but we were determined to keep (our tradition) going.”
USA drew on years of experience to survive a serious scare in the bottom of the seventh inning.
The Patriots led 5-3 entering the bottom half of the inning, with the No. 8 and No. 9 hitters in the Mendon order up next.
But things would soon get interesting, as eight hitter Brielle Bailey led off with a solid single and Abby Butler got hit by a pitch. The bases were loaded with two outs when freshman Mattea Bingaman was hit by another pitch, forcing in a run to make it 5-4 and leaving the bases loaded.
Mendon’s next hitter made contact, but popped it up to pitcher Rylie Betson, who clutched it in her glove to secure perhaps the school’s most improbable championship.
“I don’t know where those hit-by-pitches came from, I don’t know if we’ve had one of those all year,” said USA coach Marc Reinhardt, who has coached travel softball in the USA community for more than 10 years but is in his first year as varsity head coach. “But Rylie is my warrior. She came through under some serious pressure.”
USA won its third title in a row last spring behind the dominant pitching of senior Laci Harris and the bat of fellow senior Macy Reinhardt, the current coach’s daughter.
But finding someone to replace Harris in the circle was a big question, and Betson was converted from a position player to No. 1 pitcher – and came through admirably.
“We didn’t have a kid who throws 60, so we’ve had to support her and play our best behind her,” Marc Reinhardt said.
After limiting the powerful bats of Mount Pleasant Sacred Heart to just one run in Friday’s Semifinal, Betson came back and went seven more innings Saturday, allowing five hits, three walks and four earned runs.
Then the Patriots did just enough with their bats to pull out the win.
Mendon actually made the first big move of the game in the bottom of the third inning, with a two-run triple by senior pitcher Lauren Schabes, who went on to score to give the Hornets a brief 3-1 lead.
USA struck right back in the top of the fourth, highlighted by Gremel’s three-run homer, which barely cleared the outstretched glove of Mendon left fielder Rowan Allen. The play was eerily reminiscent of Friday, when USA catcher Gabriella Crumm’s shot to left field was pulled back from over the fence by Sacred Heart centerfielder Alexis Zeien – a play which has garnered national attention.
“All I was thinking up there is that I wanted to get those runners in,” said Gremel, who had seven home runs coming into Saturday’s game. “I swung my hardest, and I ended up getting myself home, too. I wasn’t expecting a home run, that’s for sure.”
USA added one more run to take a 5-3 lead, which is how it stayed until the dramatics in the bottom of the seventh.
“I thought maybe the lucky leprechaun was going to sprinkle some magic dust out there for us in the last inning, but it didn’t happen,” said Steve Butler, in his sixth year as the co-head coach of Mendon, along with Mike Smith. “We battled them right to the end, and we had a chance to win and we probably should have won. I can’t ask for anything more out of these girls.”
Schabes went five innings for Mendon (35-6) and Allen, a freshman, came in and allowed no hits over the final two innings. Schabes also finished 3-for-3 at the plate.
USA, 33-10, finished with eight hits. Gremel was 2-for-3 with the three-run homer and Olivia Jubar went 2-for-3.
Reinhardt said he took the head coaching job after his youngest daughter graduated last spring because he is determined to keep the USA tradition going. The Patriots have earned nine Finals titles, one more than Stevensville Lakeshore and Waterford Our Lady of the Lakes on the list of those that have won the most in state history.
Reinhardt got all the young players from Unionville and Sebewaing together for the team’s sendoff to the Semifinals on Friday.
“I wanted to do that to put a little bit of fire in their belly to keep this thing going,” he said. “You could hear them whisper to each other: ‘I want to do that someday.’”
PHOTOS (Top) Teammates welcome USA’s Jenna Gremel (13) home during Saturday’s Division 4 Final. (Middle) Olivia Jubar (4) rounds third base. (Below) Rylie Betson makes her move toward the plate for the Patriots. (Photos by Olivia Napier/Hockey Weekly Action Photos.)