Spartanburg Christian- 40
Calhoun Falls Charter- 22 Crscent- 28 Dixie- 17 Lincoln County- 41 McCormick- 8 Southside Christian- 37 Ware Shoals- I’ll let Elaine handle this one. Whitmire- 26 Great Falls- 16 Lamar- 28 Pageland Central- ???? Lewisville- 18 Blacksburg- 16 Chesterfield- 52 McBee- 15 Timmonsville- 46 East Clarendon- 7 Barnwell- 42 Blackville-Hilda- 42 points less than Barnwell scored. Bethune-Bowman- 22 Denmark-Olar- They failed to score in this football contest Ridgeland/Hardeeville- 47 Estill- Blutarsky’s GPA Edisto- 21 Hunter-Kinard-Tyler- 6 Branchville- 26 North- 8 Saluda- 22 Ridge Spring-Monetta- 6 Wagener-Salley- 30 Pelion- 12 Williston-Elko- 22 Silver Bluff- 6 Baptist Hill- 48 Garrett Comprehensive Technical Outpost- 8 Porter Gaud- 35 Charleston Charter School for the Culinary Arts and Animal Husbandry- ZIP North Charleston- 32 Military Magnet- 24 St. John’s- 29 R.B. Stall- 6 Bamberg-Ehrhardt- 30 C.E. Murray- 6 Cross- 40 Burke- Note: I am running out of creative means by which to indicate no points were scored. Manning- 42 Scott’s Branch- 6 Latta- 28 Creek Bridge- 8 Green Sea-Floyds- 31 East Columbus- Seriously, you can lose a game and still score points. Hannah-Pamplico- 31 Marion- 14 Hemingway- 56 Kingstree- 14 Lake View- 26 Johnsonville- 6 Breakdown- As it is still early in the season, most everyone in Class A played up last week. It was a good week on that front, with Class A teams posting a 9-11 record against teams of higher classification. Top-ranked Lamar got a very impressive victory over Pageland Central 28-0. My super secret Lamar informant tells me the game was big fat boring, but in a good way. Lamar went up 21-0 at the half and never let Pageland back in it. The Silver Foxes are dealing with some injuries the awesomely-named Jablonski Green has only been playing defense because of a sore hamstring and the team is basically down to two running backs. The defensive line is young, which means the back seven is having to make a few more plays, but that should change as they get more experience. Jacquez Lucas ran for two touchdowns and Rashard Coleman had a good night throwing the ball with near 200 yards and two touchdowns. When they get that kind of offensive balance, Lamar ain’t losing very often, Broham. They remain very deserving of that number one ranking. The Silver Foxes continue their supremely manned-up schedule this week against Darlington…Lewisville hung on, making a late goal-line stand to get an 18-16 win over a top 10 AA team in Blacksburg. Chase Yoder, who I think is a criminally underrated player, had an 86-yard fumble return for a score. Quentin Sanders, who is very underrated despite being quite highly rated (a really dumb way of saying he is good at football) scored his fifth and sixth touchdowns of the season. One of those was an 81-yarder in which he just kind of popped out of a pile and went the distance. Most impressive for Lewisville was the fact that they were missing multiple starters on both lines and still held up against a trigundous (a word I just invented that means “very big”) Blacksburg line. Down 16-12 in the final minutes, they went into their single wing package and stuck it down Blacksburg throat to the tune of 10 plays and 54 yards. When you start bopping people in the uvula and larynx, you’ve reached a certain level of physicality most teams don’t have. They’re already good and when they get physically healthy, well, Lewisville v Lamar is going to be a war…Wagener-Salley’s win over Pelion is a “little over a big” win, but not all of those are created equal. I mean, if you beat up an NFL left tackle who has weird tats and anger issues, that’s impressive. If you beat a Jim John, the really tall kid down the street who has a high voice, no thumbs and likes sniffing sharpie markers, I mean, he’s still a big guy and all, but it’s much less impressive. For new readers, I make really terrible analogies. Anyway, the Chitlinville Gridiron All-Stars took care of business against a team that’s struggled for several years. They get an interesting match-up against 2-0 Bethune-Bowman this week. The Mr. T Haircuts were a 22-0 winner over Denmark-Olar this past Friday. W-S is the favorite in this one, but watch for B-B’s Braxton Wedgeworth. He had a long touchdown run, a long touchdown pass and blocked a punt that was returned for a score last week…Williston-Elko didn’t exactly beat up on Jim John Friday, maybe his slightly more athletic brother Jim Jack as they rolled over Silver Bluff. W-E got a pair of touchdown runs from Tyran Parker but their defensive also doled out a shriek-inducing tater kickin’. They allowed only 17 yards rushing and came up with a safety. This was a young team last year that got off to an 0-2 start before winning nine straight then was soundly thrashed in the second round of the playoffs. This bunch may be built for a deeper run and the only real challenges left from now until the post-season starts is back-to-back games against Ridge Spring-Monetta and Wagener-Salley…I mentioned last week that Corey Fields, Baptist Hill’s QB, might do a bit of stat padding against Garrett and he did. If by “padding” you mean 375 yards passing with five touchdowns and 75 yards rushing. The thing is, since Baptist Hill began moving back toward respectability last year, they still haven’t beaten a good team. I mean, 450 total yards and five touchdowns is holy crap territory even when facing the likes of Jim John and Jim Jack. To really show they aren’t just a fireworks show that blows some smoke in the air and makes a pretend snake come up out of the ground (I’m the only one he didn’t see the point in blacksnakes they used to sell at fireworks stands? It looked like your yard was pooping or something) they need a big showing against a quality opponent. That opportunity beckons September 15 at Cross…I haven’t been able to find an account of Hannah-Pamplico’s win over Marion, but I’m sure they did a hell of a job. Seriously, giving Lamar a good game, followed by up win shows that H-P belongs in the top 10 (where they are now, but more on that shortly)…I keep hearing from everyone that Hemingway may be the team to beat this year in the lowcountry. I’ll have to see that to believe it, but they got off to a good start, leaving marks on Kingstree. Darius Taylor, who is good at football, had a touchdown catch, an interception and a punt return for a score IN THE FIRST FREAKIN’ HALF! They play up the next three weeks then face C.E. Murray. If they come out of that stretch 5-0, then the hype ain’t just hype…I didn’t figure having its winning streak would faze Lake View much and it didn’t, as it bounced back with a win over Johnsville. Delvon Bethea had two touchdowns and De’Ante Bridgett threw touchdowns. They also stole the opponents sausage! Not really, but I feel compelled to make a sausage reference whenever Johnsonville is mentioned…moving on. Aside from the “up” wins…I took in Great Falls-Whitmire Friday night. Typical early-season game (opener for Great Falls) with a lot of penalties. It got a little chippy here and threw with one ejection but nothing too bad. Whitmire is super young, but they have some talent. Keep an eye on wingback Jaylen Brown for them. Very slippery, very athletic and catches it well out of the backfield. They also feature a not-quite 130-pound back named Kyle Hunt who is a tough son-of-gun. The Wolverines are well coached, play hard and if you don’t see a scrum often, it’s tough to prepare for. They mix in just enough rollout passes and throws to Brown in the flat to keep you honest. Great Falls, likewise, is young. They had 12 penalties which made a big difference, as di Whitmire recovering an onside kick (they attempted those on every kickoff). Kel Brown did a solid job at quarterback and Kelton Talford (who is 17 feet tall) went up and got one for a touchdown. I think good things are ahead for them, maybe this week as they play a Blackville-Hilda team that got stumped upon Friday by Barnwell…Congrats to Timmonsville on its huge blowout win over East Clarendon. I wasn’t able to find an account of that game, but the Whirlwinds have been down a bit for a few years, but every couple of years they get a run of athletes and give a lot of folks some trouble. Here’s hoping this is one of those years…I talked to someone who was at the McBee-Chesterfield game. They confirmed what I’d heard, which is that Chesterfield is crazy loaded. They also wonder, though, if McBee might be in for a real down year. They lost a bumper crop of athletes (most of whom were named Wright), are breaking in a slew of new starters and play an absolute murderer’s row. Looking forward, they could be 0-6 after they play Lewisville and still end up being pretty good and in the playoffs. You can’t always judge a Class A team by it’s out-of-region record, especially when it’s willing to play anybody. As promised, I am printing the Prep Media Class A poll each week and the top 10 I submitted for said poll. 1. Lamar (9) 2. Lewisville (3) 3. Hemingway (1) 4. St. John's 5. Cross 6. Lake View 7. Williston-Elko 8. Wagener-Salley 9. C.E. Murray 10. Hannah-Pamplico 1. Lamar- Impressive shutout of Pageland shows they belong here until someone unseats them. 2. Lewisville- Gutted out a win over a good Blacksburg team despite being down linemen on both sides. 3. St. John’s- I moved them up based on wins over 5A and 4A opponents. 4. Cross- Cross is really good at football. 5. Hemingway- If their opening win is any indication, the hype is justified for the Tigers. 6. C.E. Murray- Not going to hold a loss to a very good AA team against them too much. Remember, they lost to B-E early last year too by a larger margin and ended up making it to the third round of the playoffs. 7. Lake View- Opening loss might be a distant memory soon. Nice win this past Friday. 8. Williston-Elko- I can easily see them not losing again until sometime in late November. Defense played an outstanding game Friday. 9. Wagener-Salley- If they start beating good teams, they will shoot up this list. 10, Hannah-Pamplico- Gave Lamar a real scare in Week 0 and came back with an “up” win this past week. I’m going to withhold my full comments on Tuesday’s realignment appeals before the appellate panel for separate BLAWG later in the week since this one is already way long. Suffice it to say I’m happy Dixie won their appeal, I wish Hannah-Pamplico and Allendale-Fairfax would have appealed and I was displeased with Lewisville’s appeal being rejected. Class A will be watered down and made unnecessarily small. I also think the panel either didn’t grasp Lewisville’s points on Title IX and competitive balance or didn’t care. On top of that, their comments were obtuse and snarky. More to come… Suggested reading (and viewing) You can read about Whitmire’s win over Great Falls here. If you think words are dumb and hard to understand, just watch this video instead. HOLY CRAP GREEN SEA THROWS THE BALL NOW WHAT PLANET IS THIS?! The eerie specter of Fumbly McFumblestein appeared at C.E. Murray’s loss to Bamberg-Ehrhardt. On a serious note, my buddy Jed Blackwell wrote a nice tribute to former Great Falls head coach Mike Martin who passed away over the weekend as part of his prep notebook.
0 Comments
Estill (0-1) at Ridgeland Hardeeville (1-0)
Estill posted a WHITE CANDY BAR HAHA I’M GOING TO WEAR THIS JOKE OUT on the scoreboard last week, of course that came at the hands of a tough Allendale-Fairfax team. This week, they’ll play up again, going on the road to face Ridgeland-Hardeeville. The Big Cookies (which is what the mascot for a team with Hardee in its name should be, so I’ll just pretend that it is) were a 12-8 winner over Thomas Heyward Academy in their opener. Jabari Williams pulled their thickburgers out of the fire with a 50-yard touchdown run late in the contest. Let’s see, candy bar line, two Hardees menu references…I think I’m done here. Hunter-Kinard-Tyler (0-1) at Edisto (0-1) A big hat tip to the Trojans for having the taters to play a super-manly schedule. They lost badly last week on the road to AAA power Fairfield Central, but that 51-6 final isn’t quite as bad as it sounds. They only gave up 200 yards of total offense to what is always an explosive Fairfield Central offense. Unfortunately, they have some work to do on special teams having given up kickoff returns of 99 and 70 yards for touchdowns. STAY IN YOUR LANE BOBBY! DADGUMMIT. Take those out, consider what the defense did and that’s a respectable showing. They play up again this week at Edisto. Edisto won’t be nearly as formidable a foe as the Griffins were, though, having lost last week 26-0 to O-W. They fumbled a lot, the end. Branchville (1-0) at North Branchville put it on the Charleston Charter Career Center and Extravagant Lunch Buffet last week 62-22. Couldn’t find any info on that one but I’m sure Branchville did a heck of a job. North hasn’t played yet, so it’s hard to know what they’ve got. Unfrotunately, they’ve struggled in terms of wins and losses for a long time, having not posted even a break-even record since 2008, so Branchville could be off to a 2-0 start. Saluda (0-1) at Ridge Spring-Monetta (0-1) Ridge Spring-Monetta is another team that has always played a studly assemblage of opponents early in the year. They lost to a very good Batesburg-Leesville team last week 40-16. They are also a team, though, that always seems ready for region play and enters the post-season on a roll. You don’t get that from playing Miss Penny’s Finishing School out of region, Jabo. Saluda, coming off a huge year, got worked by Strom Thurmond last week. RSM may come out of this 0-2 but they’ll be better for it down the road. Wagener-Salley (1-0) at Pelion (1-0) The Hand Slung All-Stars were handin’ out whoopins last week, belting Whitmire 62-7. Kevin Johnson ran for over 100 yards and three touchdowns, which is super salty to start with, then I drop the “on seven carries” part and you’re all like “WHA WHA WHAAAAT?” Anyway, they are playing a Pelion team that has, frankly, been a dumpster fire next to a train wreck on the way to see a watermelon seed spitting contest for a while….BUT, they did beat Calhoun County 33-22 last week, so maybe things are moving in the right direction. This is a big play up, facing a AAA school, but W-S won this match-up last year 50-14. I don’t think it will be that lopside, but expect Chitterling Nation to keep rolling. Silver Bluff (0-1) at Williston-Elko (0-1) Both teams came up on the losing end of things last week. Williston lost to a very good Barnwell team, while Silver Bluff may still be walking funny after what South Aiken did to them (41-6 loss). Williston, really, to be playing up against a ranked team, didn’t make a terrible showing. They gave moved the ball pretty well and didn’t get gashed by the War Horses, allowing about 300 total yards. This might be an opportunity to even their record. If they do, it is not a stretch at all to think they could run the table in the regular season. Garrett Academy Tech A&M Magnet School (Eastern Campus) (0-1) at Baptist Hill I’ll be quick and to the point. Garrett lost 22-6 to Porter Gaud last week, who does not possess QB Corey Fields. Baptist does have Corey Fields who probably won’t have much more than 4,500 total yards this season. He might do stat-padding tonight. St. John’s (1-0) at R.B Stall St. John’s sprung one of the shockers of the early season last week beat 5A James Island. If they chop down another one this week, it might be time to consider moving them up even further in the polls than they jumped this past week. C.E. Murray (1-0) at Bamberg-Ehrhardt (1-0) This is one of the games of the week. If you like watching people just kick each other face for 48 minutes, this one’s for you. C.E. Murray opened with an “up” win 22-8 over Kingstree. B-E won an odd won, getting a 7-0 win in overtime of Woodland. Jerauld Manigault saved the game with a big interception in the end zone in OT. Two tough, physical defenses, some big-time playmakers on both sides of the ball, figures to be an excellent match-up. Sadly, due to time constraints, everyone else gets the “in other action” treatment... North Charleston at Military Magnet Charleston Charter School for greater bacon studies at Porter Gaud Scott’s Branch at Manning Carvers Bay at Latta Marion at Hannah-Pamplico Lake View at Johnsonville Enjoy the games! Spartanburg Christian Academy at Calhoun Falls Charter (0-1)
Can’t really offer a ton of insight into this one, Hoss. Spartanburg Christian has a roster of 15 players, Calhoun Falls Charter has 13. Bout all I got for you on this’n. Dixie (1-0) at Crescent (1-0) Both teams are unbeaten, untied and nearly unscored upon this season. I mean, they’ve both only played one game against outmanned opponents, but you have to sell the sizzle a little. Dixie blew out Ware Shoals 48-0 last week. The Hornets (the ones from Dixie, not the ones from Ware Shoals…could someone please change their names to The Skeeters or Dirt Dobbers to make this less confusing) forced five turnovers and dominated up front. Deivon Donald scored two touchdowns on offense and ran a kick back for another score. Chandler Smalley ran for a score and caught a touchdown pass. Dixie has been smart about the way they’ve handled things, seriously dialing back their schedule last season after many years of Derp. It worked to the tune of six wins, which has gotten them going in the right direction. Last week’s victory might be an indication that Dixie is legitimately good. Whether Ware Shoals is down or not, beating somebody 48-0 is taking care of business. Crescent beat all 13 of Calhoun Falls’ school children 34-6, doing so behind a power running game led by Kenny White. It’s not a stretch at all, if you look at Dixie’s upcoming pre-region schedule, to think that they can be 7-0 going into their match-up with McCormick if they win this one. McCormick (0-1) at Lincoln County McCormick dropped a 27-16 decision last Friday to Fox Creek. They actually led 8-7 at halftime but gave up 13 unanswered points late in the game. That could be a product of playing a bigger school with a deeper bench and wearing out late. They also gave up a special teams touchdown in that one. Believe me when I tell you the Chiefs have one of the most impressive athletes in the state in running back Mataeo Durant. I saw him in the playoffs against Lewisville last year. He has an unreal first step explosion, killer moves in the open field and finishes every single run. He had about 150 yards that night against a very good Lewisville defense but you kind of held your breath every time he touched the ball, knowing he could break one on any play. I don’t know much about Lincoln County other than it’s in Georgia and the Duke boys lived there. Or was that Hazzard County? It might have been Hazzard. I think it was Hazzard. Dangit, I was all set to make a killer joke about Crazy Cooter too. Oh well. Lincoln has beaten McCormick the last three years by a combined score of 131-14, so, even with Durant, this may not go real well. Ware Shoals (0-1) at Southside Christian (1-0) Ware Shoals turned the ball over five times as they were roundly rogered by Dixie 48-0 last week. It doesn’t seem like this long, but Ware Shoals hasn’t had a winning record since 2009…now they did still make a deep playoff run a few years back, but still, it’s unusual to see this program be down for this long when they were competing for state titles less than 10 years ago. A trip to play one of the Greenville County private school all-star squads probably ain’t the salve for their Dixie-inflicted burns. Southside Christian just doled out a 51-13 whoopin’ to St. Joe’s last week Whitmire (0-1) at Great Falls The Wolverines had a rough opener last Friday, losing to what I think can be a very good Wagener-Salley team 62-7. I’m a fan of what Charlie Jenkins has done at Whitmire, and not just because he has a last name that exudes winning and greatness and everything right about humanity (we aren’t related, btw). At a school with under 200 students, he gets huge numbers out, coaches and develops players well and puts a winning product on the field. Now, when you graduate 13 starters, it sometimes takes a while to reload, but I think by the end of the year Whitmire will be just fine. Great Falls didn’t play last week…well, they didn’t play a game that counted on the record. They beat York’s JV team 26-7 (seniors weren’t allowed to play in that one). New Coach Scotty Steen has got the numbers up this year and was, in my opinion, the perfect pick for the job. He’s a Great Falls lifer, loves the school and the kids love him. Now, they are young but they have some real talent. They also go 6’4, 6’3 and 6’3 at receiver. And those aren’t tall, slow, uncoordinated people with bad knees like me…Kelton Talford, Tommy Belk and Zac Roberts are athletic and tough. Talford, frankly, may actually be a mushroom or Chia Pet. I put 6’4 because that’s what they list him at, but he legitimately looks taller every time I see him. Great Falls has a good shot to break its 15-game losing streak tonight. I’ll be taking this one in in person. Pageland Central at Lamar (1-0) The top-ranked Silver Foxes beat a good Hannah-Pamplico team 39-21 last week. However, they gave up a couple of atypical long plays and it was only a 26-21 game at one point. My covert, Lamar double agent tells me that while Lamar is still very good, they are young at some spots and may not have a cake walk most every week like last year. At least not at this point. Still, Jacquez Lucas ran for 144 yards on 12 carries and had 3 touchdowns and they notched a quality win. They face a Pageland team with a new coach in former Eagles player Trent Usher. I’ve heard nothing but good things about them. Lamar won this one 31 to NOT NAM last year, but this figures to be a good one. Lewisville (1-0) at Blacksburg The Lions rolled AJ last week 30-6. Coach Mitchell told me it seemed like a closer game than that, though. AJ did dominate time of possession and Mitchell wants to see better work up front and to see his team sustain some drives. Still, Quentin Sanders had 260 total yards and four touchdowns and the defense gave up around 60 on the ground and 60 through the air against a AA team that had a winning record last year, so not a bad night’s work. Blacksburg is a AA program on the rise, they have an abundance of large people up front, a studly D end and a quarterback committed to a Big 10 school. The concern for Lewisville is having two offensive linemen and two defensive linemen who could miss the game due to injury. That would make it tough against a team as big as Blacksburg. The Lions hung on for a two-point win in this game last year and I expect this will be tight too. McBee (0-1) at Chesterfield McBee is coming off a 30-12 loss to Lakewood. Normally a Class A team losing to a AAAA team wouldn’t raise an eyebrow, but McBee had knocked off Lakewood convincingly each of the past two years. When you lose as talented a class as McBee did, there will be an adjustment period. It doesn’t mean the good times really are over for good. Shane Hammonds and Tyrece Wright (so I was wrong, all the Wrights didn’t graduate. I know the McBee athletic department appreciates their procreativity) each had a touchdown last week and when they play like-sized competition, they will probably be the tough, competitive McBee we’ve come to know over the past three years. Of course, they don’t play like-sized competition for a while and I’ve heard nothing but “holy crap they’re loaded” about Chesterfield this year so, we’ll see. Timmonsville (0-1) at East Clarendon (0-1) Both teams lost by lopsided margins last week. Timmonsville fell to Wilson 40-6 while East Clarendon dropped a 33-7 game to Johnsonville. Man imagine being good at football AND having awesome sausage. I assume they make Johnsonville sausages in Johnsonville. Anyway, East Clarendon allowed to 100-plus yard rushers, while Timmonsville was just outmanned by a much larger opponent. What does that mean for this game? No clue. None. Can’t help ya. Blackville-Hilda at Barnwell (1-0) This is the season-opener for the Fighting Hawks, who after several down years notched a seven-win campaign in 2016. They did it by playing blunt-force-trauma football. They ran kind of a single wing variation, with a big offensive line and a quarterback that was equally large who ran lots of sweeps and traps. If they could physically overpower you, they beat you. It was a throwback to old-timey football when guys named W.E. and L.R. smoked in the huddle and ran a wedge offense and didn’t wear pads and derided teammates not willing to play through lung punctures as sissies. Anyway, we’ll see what they’ve got this year, but they get a mighty stiff task in the opener against a ranked AA Barnwell team that beat them 24-0 last year. Denmark-Olar (0-1) at Bethune-Bowman (1-0) These teams will battle for the Old Oaken Hyphen Trophy Friday night. Or they should, anyway. Denmark was on the receiving end of a good rootin’ last week, falling Scott’s Branch 50-6. Bethune-Bowman won a wild one over Military Magnet 48-27. This is a program that took a bit of a step forward last season and had a winning record. They ran for huge yardage last week. Quarterback Braxton Wedgeworth didn’t throw for a lot of yards, but he did toss two touchdowns and run for 178 yards and three more touchdowns. Also they have a running back named Jesus. Jesus Benjamin who had 110 yards and a score. Joseph Ayers went for 94 on the ground. This feels like a an opportunity for another big offensive night for the Mr. T Haircuts. Part II of my Class A preview will be up sometime tomorrow. When the South Carolina High School League first unveiled its currently-in-use realignment plan, legendary Great Falls Coach/AD John Smith said it was apparent that the league was aiming more for competitive balance than ease of travel. The recently unveiled realignment plan (which is set to take effect next year) does the same thing, the league itself has said. That may be true in theory where Class A is concerned, but it won’t be once the law of unintended consequences fully plays out.
If the new realignment plan stays intact, the number of Class A teams drops from 40 to 37 (some private schools and academies that field only one or two sports are moving in, thus plugging some of the holes) and the number of football-playing schools drops from 34 to 29. Lewisville, Dixie, Hannah-Pamplico, Charleston Charter and East Clarendon are all scheduled to move up out of Class A into AA. East Clarendon’s move is understandable as they now have enrollment over 400 and Charleston Charter requested that they be allowed to move up. Shifting the other three up doesn’t make sense to me on a number of levels. Just generally, I don’t like moving multiple teams out of Class A and not moving anyone down. Hard to understand the logic in moving Lewisville, Dixie, and Hannah-Pamplico up to AA, creating three, seven-team AA regions and leaving three, five-team Class A regions in their wake (and for football purposes, it’s three regions with only four football-playing members). None of those schools is crazily outsized for Class A and Dixie actually lost enrollment from the last 135-day numbers. Why is McBee, at 339 students, in Class A while Allendale-Fairfax (who was moved up to AA last time around, didn’t want to go and badly wants to come back down) in AA at 340? A league representative told me directly that the rationale “was to place schools in classifications that created the lowest disparity in enrollment between the largest and smallest school in each classification.” That’s fine, and I’m not saying realignment is an easy process or one where everyone gets what they want, but why stop there? Why not send McBee up too, since that would lessen the disparity even more, right? Of course it INCREASES the disparity in the biggest and smallest schools in AA at the same time. It feels like the league artificially set a cap at 340 students and is trying to protect the state’s smallest schools. As I’ve noted before, you can’t make decisions based on outlier schools at the very top (Wando and its 4,000-plus students) or very bottom (Calhoun Falls Charter at 94 students), though. You can’t make a classification where a school with under 100 students can reasonably expect to regularly contend for state titles in all sports, just like you can’t craft a 5A class where the smallest school isn’t going to be dwarfed by Wando. All three can approach their appeals tomorrow from different angles. All are within 50 students of what is slated to be the largest school in Class A. When the league went to five classes last year after decades of a four-class system (to reduce the difference between the largest and smallest schools in each class) it included a provision that a school within 50 students of the cutoff at the top or bottom of any class could be moved up or down to help balance a region where needed. They can make the previously noted argument that the move creates three bloated AA regions and leaves three depleted Class A regions. Also to crown a region champion, have an all-region team or a region player of the year, a region must have at least three schools participating in a sport and the move could leave all three affected Class A regions unable to do so in multiple sports. For example, Lewisville leaving Region II-A would leave only two schools playing volleyball or competing in boys or girls cross-country. A Title IX argument could certainly be made, since that would have a more adverse effect on girl’s athletics in the region. Title IV reads in part “no person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance." High schools have been successfully sued under Title IX for a lack of girl’s athletic opportunities in the past. I think the most compelling argument of all, though, is the league’s own stated goal of competitive balance. In theory, moving three larger Class A teams up, ones who just had strong (though not thoroughly dominant by any stretch) athletic years makes Class A more competitive. In practice, though, something else is going to happen. Per the league constitution, for a classification to stage playoffs and crown a state champion there have to be at least 12 schools in the classification participating in a sport. With Charleston Charter and East Clarendon definitely and understandably moving up, Lewisville, Dixie and Hannah-Pamplico slated to join them and Allendale-Fairfax not being allowed to come back down, there won’t be enough teams playing multiple sports for Class A to have its own state champion. So what happens in those instances? The same thing that happened in girl’s soccer this past year, that being that Class A teams have to compete in the AA playoffs. Under the new realignment plan, Class A teams would have to be pushed up to the AA playoffs in boys soccer, girls soccer, boys and girls cross country and boys and girls golf. The numbers would be really close on volleyball and girls track as well. Put another way, Class A teams would be run up into the AA post-season in everything except football, baseball, softball and girls and boys basketball. So, Class A schools will be competing against schools with enrollment of close to 700, a daunting task for North (160 students), Whitmire (178 students) or heck, even McBee at 339 students. Also, moving up to AA means competing (again) against Christ Church, St. Joe’s, Fox Creek, Gray Collegiate and a slew of other non-public schools that have no fixed attendance zones, can draw students from anyway, can recruit and offer scholarships and can cap enrollment to keep from moving up in classification if they so choose. Part of the reason the league went to five classes and built in the flexibility rule for schools within 50 students of a classification cutoff in the first place was to move non-public schools out of Class A, where there were dominating in almost every sport. Going up against privates/charters and public schools with two, three, four (and in extreme cases six) times their enrollment all but guarantees Class A schools would have ZERO chance to win state. Sure seems like they’d be a lot more competitive playing Lewisville (380 students), Hannah-Pamplico and Dixie (354 students each) and other Class A schools. No appeals today that dealt with a school trying to change classifications was successful. I hope that won’t be the case tomorrow, for the sake of Class A as a whole…and for the purpose of competitive balance. Crescent- 34
Calhoun Falls Charter- Nam Dixie- 48 Ware Shoals- Considerably less than 48 Fox Creek- 27 McCormick- 16 Wagener-Salley- 62 Whitmire- 7 Lamar- 39 Hannah-Pamplico- 21 Lewisville- 30 Andrew Jackson- 6 Lakewood- 30 McBee- 12 Wilson- 40 Timmonsville- 6 Scott’s Branch- 50 Denmark-Olar- 6 Allendale-Fairfax- 22 Estill- Love (if they were playing tennis) Fairfield Central- 51 Hunter-Kinard-Tyler- 6 Batesburg-Leesville- 40 Ridge Spring-Monetta- 6 The Battlin’ Barts- 24 Williston-Elko- 6 Branchville- 62 Charleston Charter Technical State School of cipherin’ and gazintas- 22 Bethune-Bowman- 48 Military Magnet- 27 St. John’s- 34 John’s Island- 28 C.E. Murray- 22 Kingstree- 8 Cross- 40 Burke- 0 Mullins- 42 Creek Bridge-Wikipedia isn’t always accurate but seems to be on this topic. Johnsonville- 33 East Clarendon- 7 Green Sea-Floyds- 31 East Columbus- SING IT D-WIGHT! Latta- 26 Lake View- 22 Breakdown- As is always the case early in the season, a lot of Class A teams played up in Week White Candy Bar. Class A teams went 4-10 against schools from higher classifications. Your winners included Lewisville over Andrew Jackson, C.E. Murray over Kingstree, Cross over Burke and St. John’s over James Island. The last of those is fairly impressive, since it represents a 1A school slaying a 5A dragon….um, I don’t know if James Island is a dragon necessarily. I doubt they fly, breathe fire and engage in other dragon activities. They are definitely a lizard, maybe even one big enough to bite you and break the skin. Still, that’s a school from our state’s tiniest classification whacking one from the biggest, which is a noteworthy achievement. I’m struggling to find a written account of that game, so if you were on hand I’d love to know how that went down…Lewisville’s game with Andrew Jackson was a little more closely contested than the score would indicate, but the Lions defense (which has three players with Division I offers) held the Vols to under 130 yards of total offense. Quentin Sanders, a do-everything football ninja that comes complete with throwing stars, had 260 total yards of offense and accounted for four touchdowns for the Lions…Cross won big thanks to two touchdown runs each from Nate Walker (Wofford commit) and Koby Lisbon and also because they were playing Burke. I mean, not to be mean about it, but they’ve got one win in the last five years. Cross will play up the next two weeks against Timberland and Kingstree…Haven’t seen an account of C.E. Murray’s win over Kingstree but that win isn’t a shocker either. I think the War Eagles are underrated (more on that in a minute), they have good number out for new coach Chad Wilkes, they’ve tweaked the offense a bit, Darius Rush is probably better than you at football etc. and so on and whatnot…McBee’s loss is an interesting one. Truthfully, a Class A team losing to a AAAA squad shouldn’t be attention-getting at all, given the enormous disparity in student enrollment. However, they’d beaten Lakewood each of the past two years fairly handily. I’ve talked to a lot of people who expect the Panthers to completely fall off the map this year (I’m not among them) because the class of athletes that suddenly made them contenders in multiple sports out of nowhere has graduated. I think all the Wright’s are gone.. Dashonnell, Richardo…Ben, Wilbur, the whole lot of them. It is conceivable they could open 0-4 with games against Chesterfield, Cheraw and Mullins coming up, but 0-4 against that schedule doesn’t mean you can’t contend in Class A, it means you lined up a manly schedule and suffered some in terms of wins and losses. I’ve noted before that McBee, even when bereft of talent, always has kids that play hard. Combine that with an offense you don’t see often and a couple of athletes to make it go and when it matters (namely in the region), the Panthers can still be just fine…I certainly didn’t expect to see Wagener-Salley roll Whitmire the way they did (62-7). You’ll remember than that the Stump-Whooped All-Stars got off to a big start last year, hit a swoon, finished strong then got pantsed by Lewisville in the first round of the playoffs. I wasn’t sure what to make of them, since they really didn’t beat any good teams. However, they had some major injuries down the stretch, which probably played a part. Hard not to take notice of a win like they had last week, or the fact that Kevin Johnson is basically Barry Sanders on Madden 95 (where if you just ran up the gut out of the I and bounced it to the left on every carry he’d end up with 4,000 yards rushing at the end of the year, because the game wasn’t smarter than you then like it is now…there were bugs and quirks you could exploit to embarrass your computer competition, but now it reads your mind and crap and is an impossibly cruel tormentor…also this is a lot of words to put in parenthesis) with 108 yards and three touchdowns on seven flippin’ carries…So, my double-secret Lamar informant is back for another year and he took in the opening win for the top-ranked Silver Foxes over Hannah-Pamplico. That contest was actually 26-21 at the half. Hannah-Pamplico hit two long touchdowns, which is a little atypical of Lamar. My informant thinks the team, while still very good, is a bit of a work in progress that should improve with time and may not have quite the horses it did last year when they were clearly head-and-shoulders above everyone not named Lake View. Not having a kicker who is automatic anymore is a bit of a difference too, he said. Still, very good and very deserving of that top ranking. Interested to see what happens with them facing Pageland Central this coming week. Being so competitive in the loss makes H-P worth watching too…Lake View’s loss isn’t a surprise given that Latta is awfully good and since the Wild Gators lost a jagnormous (a word I just made up) senior class from last year. That ended Class A’s longest winning streak but, you know, Dillon County always seems blessed with an abundance of large and fast school children, so I’m pretty sure they’ll be OK. Also, I’m happy to announce that I now get a vote in the S.C. Prep Media Football Poll. Maybe they thought my many years of prep sports coverage would make me an informed voter that would add something to the process. Or maybe they just want to copy off my 1A paper. Either way, I’m honored. So, below is the newest 1A poll, followed by my poll with a brief explanation of why I voted the way I did. I’ll post this every week. 1. Lamar (10) 2. Lewisville (4) 3. Hemingway (1) 4. Cross 5. St. John's 6. C.E. Murray 7. Lake View 8. Williston-Elko 9. Wagener-Salley 10. McBee Receiving votes: Dixie, Baptist Hill, Bethune-Bowman, Green Sea Floyds, Hannah-Pamplico 1. Lamar- Defending upperstate champ has name talent returning and a well-earned reputation of being a tough, physical team. Beat a good H-P team last week. 2. Lewisville- Not super deep, but the front-line talent is as good as anybody in the classification, maybe better. Holding what was a good AJ team in 2016 to 120-some yards is impressive. 3. C.E. Murray- Brian Smith laid the groundwork for success here and Wilkes should keep it going. SEC talent in Darius Rush and other returners make the War Eagles a contender. Made it to third round last year before losing to eventual champ Lake View (they were the only team to really challenge Lake View) and got to state the year before that. They belong in top three in my opinion. 4. St. John’s- Moved way up from the previous week for me. Solid 2016 campaign followed by win over a 5A team warrants that. 5. Cross-Showed last week, last season and the season before that they belong among Class A’s elite. 6. Lake View- Lost a big senior class from last year’s state title team, but no reason to drop them too far based on loss to a good AA team. 7. Hemingway- Haven’t played yet, but talk is they could be team to beat in the lowcountry. 8. Williston-Elko- Won nine games last year with a young squad. Loss to a good Barnwell team shouldn’t count too much against them. 9. Wagener-Salley-CHITTERLINGS! 10. McBee- With their schedule, could be a while before we really get to see how good they are relative to other Class A teams. Suggested reading… You can’t see Quentin Sanders because ninjas sometimes don’t want to be seen. CHITTERLINGS! Hey, Lamar remains proficient in the sport of football. Timmonsville did lose 40-6 but it was 7-6 at one point, which should count for something. Playing the boys from Berkeley County was quite a CROSS to bear for Burke. See what I did there? If you went to a game, have a stats from a game or want to tell me to pound sand, you can contact me at [email protected] or in the comment section. As fans we watch football on Mondays, Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. And when we are not watching live games we are watching replays. The only problem with all of that is if you watch that much football you have to somewhat know three different sets of rules. Most of us THINK we know them but the reality is we don’t. I thought I did. Right up until the day I decided I wanted to be a High School football official. After one meeting I knew I really didn’t KNOW football. Oh sure I had played a little, watched a bunch. Had season tickets to Clemson for years but nothing could prepare me for the task I was about to undertake.
From the first moment I stepped into that class room at the end of April, that’s right, April. I knew I was in for an experience. They handed me a rule book. It’s a little book. Only 5 X 7. And it only contains ten rules. Only ten you may ask. Yep, only ten. Those ten however, are 100 pages of information. Everything from how to mark the field to how to officiate six player football games. There are uniform requirements, definitions, timing rules, downs, ball statuses, kicks, snaps, passes, touchbacks, touchdowns, penalty enforcement, spots, well you get the picture. And if that is not enough there is the mechanics manual, no not a repair manual, but a manual that instructs the official where they need to be on every type of play, signals by which to communicate, how to move the chains, what grooming requirements, etc. So as you can see there is a lot of information to comprehend. A daunting task. Thankfully there are experienced officials to help you learn all of this information. You sit through weekly meetings and listen to all of these experienced officials talk of things that happen during the games and try to apply the rules to what they are saying. So after a summer full of meetings and trying to comprehend the rules and nuances of the officiating vocation, you are rewarded with a trip to Columbia where the commissioner of the South Carolina Football Officials Association administers a test. What a reward! The test is only 100 true/ false questions. 100 questions where words like ALWAYS, ILLEGAL, LEGAL, NOT, ANY, MUST, SHALL, MAY are used as weapons to ensure that you really are sure of the rules. This is where you realize that you STILL don’t know football. A passing grade will allow you to get on the field where all of your hard work and commitment through the summer can now be applied to the fun stuff, actually being on the field to call a scrimmage. Wow, you may say, you actually get to officiate a scrimmage. Surely you didn’t think you just walked out on the field for the first time to officiate an actual game. Scrimmages are fun. You are finally on the field seeing snaps. Seeing football from the stands as a fan is a lot different than seeing it from field level. Add in the fact that you are now looking for fouls and the game moves ALOT slower from the stands. The play comes at you at what seems like a really fast pace. Because of that perceived speed you as an individual begin to move at a fast pace. Even after all of these years when I am helping a new official I notice how they tend to be hurried. It’s just natural but you have to learn to slow the pace. You are not there alone. There is an experienced official with you to help you so that makes it easier but it is still challenging those first few scrimmages. Oh, and by the way, you realize you STILL don’t know football. You know more than you did when you started in April but you realize there is still a great deal left to learn. Once the scrimmages are done you finally move to officiating real games. No not 5A games, but 7th grade, 8th grade, C team and JV games. Maybe even little league games. Any game you can call just so you can see snaps and hone your craft. When I became an official it was three years before I received my first Varsity assignment. And even then it was as a fill in for someone that turned their game assignment back in. But I was ready, nervous, but ready. I had studied hard, done well on the exam, learned from many experienced officials and now it was my turn to apply what I had learned. Real games at the varsity level are different than all of the other classifications. They are more formal. The intensity level is taken up a notch or two. The coaches are more engaged. The fans are more engaged. To quote the SEC mantra, “IT JUST MEANS MORE”. So as an official you have to raise your game and awareness to that level. Not an easy task when your first varsity assignment has thrown you into a 3A rivalry game. But you do your best. Luckily you are part of a team of officials that realize one of their primary responsibilities is to support each other. You make it through the game without incident but still realize there is a great deal you STILL don’t know about football. Yearly you follow the same routine. Meetings beginning in April. Exams taken in July. Scrimmages in August. Games beginning in August running through October, and if you are fortunate, playoffs in November and December. All of that is worth the effort though when the opening kickoff on a Friday night game is about to happen. You stand looking at the field and know for the next 2 1/2 hours you will be a part of something special. Whatever game or level you are officiating the attitude should be that this the most important game being played. There are a lot of great people in officiating. They strive to get the call right. They WANT to get the call right. It doesn’t matter to them who wins or loses. The just want it to be a fair competition and they realize that without the officials, it’s just a scrimmage Actions and decisions come as instinct. You have to see it, recognize it is against the rules, and make a call in a split second. Was the ball in the air? Did he hold? Was his initial contact in the back? Did that player’s helmet contact the other player’s helmet? Flags may come late but you are processing what you saw. As fans we want that flag to be quick. We saw the foul, how can the Ref not see that? It clearly happened. A great deal about calling a foul is being in the right position and having the correct angle to see the contact. I remember I was four games into my seventh season when started to feel comfortable being an official. And yet after 16 years I realize there are STILL things I am learning. There will be things that happen that I have not seen. I am better equipped than when I started but I always learn something in every game. As fans we want to question the official’s judgment, knowledge, even their heritage. We want to scream and yell at them. That’s OK. As officials we all know that is just part of the game. You can’t have thin skin or rabbit ears and be a good official. So in the coming season when you are watching that little league, sub-varsity or varsity football game and want to blast that official, go ahead. It’s part of the game. But, remember, at one time they thought they knew football too. I encourage anyone who is interested in becoming a football official to contact someone in your area about joining the ranks. We always need good people. The season began for most Class A teams on Friday. I’d hoped to have full previews on every team, then again I also hoped I’D GET TO SEE THE STUPID ECLIPSE AND THAT DIDN’T WORK OUT EITHER! Not that I’m bitter or anything…
I sent some questionnaires out to as many Class A coaches as I could find an email address for…which to be honest, wasn’t many. There are still spots in our state where if you want to tell your mama you love her and she lives a few miles away, you have to tie the message to a pigeon’s foot and just hope that enemy fire or hungry gators don’t keep it from making it to mama’s house. And, you know, that the bird knows where your mama lives and doesn’t just poop on the windshield of her old Buick as it keeps on flying to freedom. I forgot what I was talking about…oh yeah, so anyway, I got a few of those back (is two “a few?”) I cover a couple of Class A teams as part of my pay-the-bills gig, so I linked to those too. Outside of that, yeah um, do you some Googling. Lamar High School Silver Foxes Corey Fountain- 4th season as the head coach-33 wins and 8 losses Top Returners: Jeblonski Green-RB/LB Sr. Chandler Johnson-C Sr. Rashard Coleman-QB Sr. David Cribb-LB Sr. Tijuan Burroughs-RB/LB Sr. Jacquez Lucas-RB/DB Jr. Malik Johnson-WR/DB Jr. Jordan Green-OL/DL Jr. Key Losses: Randy Wheeler DE Luke Amerson OL/DL Russ Freeman DL Roderick Brown DB Daniel Galloway OL/DL JQ Caesar OL Randall Woods DE/WR Audy Tedder PK/P Bottom line: “We will be young on both the offensive and defensive line. They must grow up quick and be physical if we are going to be successful. Our young men have worked hard during the off season. Hopefully the hard work will translate into success on the football field, but only time will tell.” Whitmire: Region I Calhoun Falls Dixie McCormick Ware Shoals Whitmire Last year's record (with region record, region finish): 1.McCormick 4-0 2. WHITMIRE 2-2 (We beat Dixie to finish 2nd in Region) 3. Dixie 2-2 4. Ware Shoals 1-4 5. Calhoun Falls 1-4 Years at school- this will be year 4 2014 5-6 lost at McCormick in 1st round of playoffs 2015 6-5 lost at RSM in 1st round 2016 4-7 hosted 1st playoff game in 10 years but lost 42-44 in Overtime to HKT Any major coaching staff changes- nope Returning offensive starters: TE- Alan Mikel Stanley QB- BaileyHolloman OG- JordanStone OT- CJSaverance C- AndrewFelker Returning defensive starters: CB-JREpps FS- TreyLyles CB- JaylenBrown LB- Matthew Prather Base offense- Hugh Wyatt Double Wing (The Scrum) Base defense- 3-4 Returning lettermen: JREpps QuentinAughtry KyleHunt TreyLyles LomasDavis Alan MikelStanley GarrettDavis JaylenBrown BaileyHolloman BenBurleson Caleb Bowers Matthew Prather Alex Little DonteFisher JordanStone CJSaverance AndrewFelker Key returning players with stats if available: All the returning starters. Not stats really. All the stats graduated on offense with Vo, Renwick, and McCarley. We will be looking for some new stats guys. Key losses: Five 3 year starters- ALL Region OL Noah Armstrong, All Region & Class A All StateWingback 1000 rusher Devin Vo, Wing Back/Line backer AJ Renwick, All Region DL Daquan Agnew, FB /DE Chase McCarley Two 2 Year Starters- All Region DE Culan Means and OL Matthew Mathias Strongest Man on Team- LB Chop Ruff Great Falls Lewisville Various lowcountry previews courtesy of SCNow. A full digital thingy I did for the teams I cover... I think everything that can possibly be said about realignment has now been said…so of course I’m now going to say more things about realignment because wearing out a topic to the point that people’s gag reflexes are triggered is what the sports media does better than anyone.
I already shared my overall feeling with you on the topic yesterday. I don’t like moving multiple teams out of Class A and not moving anyone down. I don’t understand the logic in moving Lewisville (380 students), Dixie (354) and Hannah-Pamplico (354) up to AA, creating three, seven-team AA regions and leaving three, five-team Class A regions in their wake (and for football purposes, it’s three regions with only four football-playing members). I don’t understand the logic behind having McBee in Class A at 339 students, but not Allendale-Fairfax (who would really like to be back in Class A) at 340. I asked the South Carolina High School League about those points and asked for a general idea on what their thought process was when it came to their approach to Class A. They did respond… “The rationale was to place schools in classifications that created the lowest disparity in enrollment between the largest and smallest school in each classification.” Alrighty. It’s not my intention to beat them up here. Realignment is a long, hellish endeavor that is always going to leave a lot of people unhappy, since nobody wants to be the smallest team in a class and nobody wants to be in a region with West-Where-The-Hell Tech, which is five hours from anywhere and doesn’t have paved roads and you have to park your bus and ford across a skeeter-infested creek to get there. But somebody has to be the smallest school in a class and somebody has to get their pants wet wading across that creek. However, to me, the league already achieved the goal of lessening the gap between the largest and smallest in each class by going to a five-class system with our current realignment plan. The moves made in the proposed plan, we’re only talking about a handful of difference on enrollment. So McBee will be the biggest team in Class A at 339, but Allendale-Fairfax at 340 is somehow too many? Hannah-Pamplico and Dixie at 354 (15 more than McBee) is outsized? Lewisville at 380 is out of the question? Yes, the move lessens the gap between big and small in Class A, but it increases it in AA. The schools headed up to AA will now be tasked with facing schools twice their size. Yes, to stay in Class A means they will be two or three times bigger than some schools…I said it before, but there are a handful of very tiny little Class A schools with 100-ish students. I love those schools, but you can’t make decisions based on those because they’re outliers and they’re always going to be much smaller than the biggest school in their classification no matter how far down you cut the number. And it isn’t like they can’t compete (see HKT’s football state titles recently, Whitmire’s turnaround success on the gridiron, Calhoun Falls Charter’s run to upperstate in boys basketball etc.). To me, with the five-class system in place, decisions on teams who are “on the bubble” enrollment-wise should be made based on practicality and creating three, four-team football regions in Class A to create bloated seven-team ones in AA doesn’t fit the bill there. I also don’t think it’s good practice to have a classification with 37 schools (only 29 football-playing teams) especially when that class is the most apt to lose schools. There are supposed to be 42 overall teams in Class A right now, but there’s only 40 because Tamassee-Salem and Lincoln were closed down. Schools with under 200 students are always going to be in the crosshairs of someone trying to cut expenses. What if the new plan holds and there are more closures. What if Calhoun Falls Charter goes to eight-man (as I’ve heard is a possibility at some point) ball? In that case, with Dixie having been moved out of that region, you’d be left with three school that play football? A three-team region? Really? Schools with low enrollment can also have cycles where they have a low percentage of boys. The percentage of boys in a school is a genetic crap shoot and sometimes that does make a difference. Great Falls had 190-some student last year, but only 80-some boys. That improves everyone’s chances of having a date on prom night, but it can spell doom for a football team. Indeed, Great Falls forfeited one game last year and was close to pulling the plug on the season. Leaving Lewisville, Hannah-Pamplico and Dixie in Class A and moving Allendale-Fairfax down provides a layer of insurance that Class A needs and AA doesn’t. I hope they all appeal and I hope those appeals are successful. Couple of random notes: *I declared the moving of Charleston Charter School for ‘Cipherin and Bug Studies (277 kids) up to AA total lunacy, but figured there had to be a reason. There was. They requested it for travel purposes, I’m told. *I’ve sent out some pre-season questionnaires to as many Class A coaches as I could find. I’ve gotten a few back, but if you received one, please take a second and fill it out so I can provide as much info on every school as possible. Some contact info is proving hard to find, so if you’re a Class A coach and haven’t heard from me, shoot your contact info to [email protected] or message me @CNR_Sports. When the SCHSL underwent its most recent realignment, the decades-old four-class system was scrapped for a new five-class system. The hope was that reducing the difference in size between the largest and smallest school in each class would level the playing field in terms of competitiveness. At least in the case of Class A, the powers-that-be obviously don’t think that move went quite far enough, since the new realignment proposal unveiled today (set to take effect next school year) reduces the overall size of Class A a bit and the number of football-playing schools considerably.
Every two years, the SCHSL undergoes realignment, a process of grouping schools into regions based on size and proximity. Before we analyze the new plan and the proposed changes, let’s take a look at the current make-up of regions and the proposed changes that realignment would bring. Current: Region I- Calhoun Falls, Dixie, High Point Academy*, McCormick, SCSDB*, Ware Shoals and Whitmire. Region II- Governor’s School for Math and Science*, Great Falls, Lamar, Lewisville, McBee and Timmonsville. Region III- Blackville-Hilda, Denmark-Olar, Estil, Hunter-Kinard-Tyler, North, Ridge Spring-Monetta, Wagener-Salley and Williston-Elko. Region IV- Baptist Hill, Charleston Charter, Low Country Leadership*, Military Magnet, Palmetto Scholars*, Royal Live Oaks* and St. John’s. Region V- Bethune-Bowman, Branchville, C.E. Murray, Cross, Richland One Middle College* and Scott’s Branch. Region VI- Creek Bridge, East Clarendon, Green Sea-Floyds, Hannah-Pamplico, Hemingway and Lake View. Proposed Region I- Calhoun Falls, High Point*, McCormick, SCSDB*, Ware Shoals and Whitmire. Region II- Governor’s School*, Great Falls, Lamar, McBee and Timmonsville. Region III- Blackville-Hilda, Denmark-Olar, Hunter-Kinard-Tyler, North, Ridge Spring-Monetta, Wagener-Salley and Williston-Elko. Region IV- Baptist Hill, Bridges Prep*, Estill, Lowcountry Leadership*, Military Magnet, Phillip Simmons, Royal Live Oaks* and St. John’s. Region V- Bethune Bowman, Branchville, C.E. Murray, Cross, Richland One Middle College* and Scott’s Branch. Region VI- Coastal Leadership*, Creek Bridge, Green Sea-Floyds, Hemingway and Lake View. A * Denotes that a school does not field a football team or that the football team does not compete in the SCHSL or maybe I think a * spices up an otherwise boring block of text. So, Region I stays the same except for losing Dixie, which moves up to AA. In Region II, Lewisville moves up to AA. Estill moves out of Region III, which is an upperstate region and goes to Region IV, which is a lowerstate region. That actually makes sense, because Estill is many things, but “located in upper anything” don’t make the list, Hambone. In addition to picking up Estill, Region IV loses Charleston Charter to AA, picks up the new Phillip Simmons High and adds something called Bridges Prep. I don’t know if it’s located near a bridge, or if it was founded by Todd Bridges, I just know that it was built with lots of love. Moving on…Region V is the only Class A region not to change at all and Region VI gets all small-ified with the departure of East Clarendon and Hannah-Pamplico. Also something called Coastal Leadership joins them. Their website bills them as “Horry’s County’s best kept secret” which seems accurate since I heretofore did not know they existed. So overall, Class A goes from 40 teams down to 37 but the number of football playing schools drops from 34 to 29. The low-to-high enrollment ratio is 106 to 365 under the current system. Under the new system it will be 94 to 339, so not a huge change, really. I understand East Clarendon moving up. It would be hard to justify keeping a team with over 400 students (and growing apparently) in Class A in general and in a region where nearly everyone else has less than 300 students in particular. The others don’t make much sense to me at all. Hannah-Pamplico gained eight students from 2015 to 2017 (up to 354) yet are moving up to AA. In terms of their region match-ups, the difference isn’t huge…if they stayed in their current region they’d be playing Creek Bridge (175 students), Green Sea-Floyds (334), Hemingway (297) and Lake View (284). Now they’ll face Carver’s Bay (389), East Clarendon (405), Johnsonville (398), Kingstree (623), Latta (479) and Mullins (423). They aren’t so much bigger than their current Region VI-A brethren that they represent an unfair match-up for anyone. They had a good 2016-’17 athletic year but weren’t dominant in any sport that I recall. It’s not like they are badly needed to balance out an undersized AA region. Moving them up, in fact, makes VII-AA a bloated seven-team region and reduces to VI-A to a five-team region, with only four schools that play football. Why not leave them where they are, giving each of those coastal regions six teams and giving VI-A five that play football? I have no clue why the Charleston Charter School for Math, Science and Extra Long Recesses (or whatever their name is) is moving up to AA with 277 students. On it’s face, that’s complete lunacy. I’m sure there is a reason and if you happen to know what it is, please leave it in the comments section or tweet me @CNR_Sports. I’ll then share it with everyone because it’s never to late for me to pretend like I knew all along. Assuming there’s a good explanation for Charleston Charter etc. etc., moving up, Lewisville has the second biggest beef of any school. Per the old 135-day numbers, Lewisville was the largest school in Class A at 365 students and per the new numbers they gained 15 (up to 380). Again, they aren’t so crazily out-sized compared to their region mates that they should be shoved up to AA. They’ll go from playing McBee (projected to be the new largest Class A school at 339 students), Lamar (323), The Governor’s School for Math, Science and Animal Husbandry (250), Great Falls (193) and Timmonsville (193). The Governor’s School number is actually a little misleading since they have only juniors and seniors on campus. Now, Lewisville would be almost twice the size of Great Falls and Timmonsville, but when you have schools with under 200 students, you are going to have trouble finding totally like-sized schools to pair them with. That’s just a fact. Now Lewisville will be in a region with North Central (469 students), Chesterfield (510), Pageland Central (607), Buford (624), Andrew Jackson (633) and Lee Central (637). So they’ll be facing one sorta, kinda like-sized school, one that has 130 more students than them and four that have more than 225 students than them. Compiling a realignment plan is difficult and someone is always going to get the dirty butt end of things, but that differential is stark. And here again, it’s not like they are the only school in an area where someone is needed to help bulk up a thin AA region. Take them out and that’s still a six-team region. Taking them out of II-A leaves that as a five-team region, only four of which play football. So, it would be understandable if one viewed that as the larger class being taken care of, while Class A is offered the furthest and driest of hind ti…you know what, we’ll stop there. Let’s just stop there. Maybe there is a thought that with all the industrial growth in the Richburg area, Lewisville is on the verge of a population explosion and they may as well go to AA now. I can tell you, though, that hasn’t happened yet and if it’s going to, it will be a while, since there isn’t enough housing in that area at this point to support a boom. Also, in terms of travel, Great Falls gets kicked in the jubblies if their county rival moves on. That means their closest region game is 102 miles and more than two hours round-trip (to McBee). Once every other year for football isn’t awful, but that’s a yearly trip for every other sport. You have to think about that random Tuesday night softball game. Bad as the plight of the Lions is, no one, and I mean no one, got a larger, more underserved rootin’ from this new realignment than Dixie. The school actually saw its enrollment numbers DROP from (363 to 354) and somehow still moved up to AA. They would have been the largest school in their Class A region by a bit, but this goes back to what I said about Lewisville playing Great Falls and Timmonsville. It is impossible to create a region in which Calhoun Falls Charter, with 94 students, will be playing liked-size schools. Dixie isn’t so much larger than Ware Shoals and McCormick that they can’t be competed with. With the exception of softball, I don’t remember them being untouchably dominant in any sport in their region. They’ll now be matched up with Abbeville (487), Batesburg-Leesville (542), Fox Creek (589), Ninety-Six (493), Saluda (603) and Silver Bluff (640). So schools who are world-beaters in every sport and have nearly 300 more students than Dixie. Have fun with it, Hornets. It gets even worse come playoff time, when they (and Lewisville and the others) will be competing not only with much larger public schools, but with the private and charter schools (the ones who can offer scholarships, have no fixed attendance lines and cap enrollment whenever they like) who previously dominated Class A and are now taking over AA. I don’t understand, again, why a AA region that would be just fine with six teams gets an undersized seventh thrown in from Class A. That leaves Region I-A with six schools, but two of those field very few athletic teams and (once more) only four play football. I find it odd that the league wants to move five Class A schools up to AA, but aren’t moving a single AA team down to Class A. That includes Allendale-Fairfax, who would dearly like to be back in Class A and have one more student (340) than McBee. NOPE! I don’t know this for certain, but it sure feels like someone either subconsciously or unofficially decided 340 was the cutoff to be in Class A. I certainly don’t think the league is intentionally trying to short change any individual school and dividing up over 200 schools into regions and classes that make sense is extremely difficult. I’ve reached out to the league with some questions about why certain moves were made and will share the answers here if I get them. Lewisville had a very good year all-around in athletics but they only won one state title (in baseball) and the other borderline schools going up didn’t dominate in multiple sports either, so it doesn’t seem like the moves were made for competitiveness sake. As currently constructed,, the new realignment only seems to make Class A smaller for the sake of making it smaller. |
TravisI am Travis, the king 0f SC 1A Football Archives
November 2021
Categories |