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Eliminate Semi-State or First Round Ticket Match?


wrealwrestler101

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A common question amongst Indiana wrestling fans: How can we raise our participation numbers in the state finals? Some say we should introduce class wrestling to allow smaller schools to receive a chance at the big show down at Bankers, but there are (obviously) other options. In my opinion, looking at the New Jersey single class route, one option is that we can eliminate semi-state, keep our 32 sectional sites, and drop 16 regional sites to eight. If population is an argument, it shouldn't be necessarily, as Indiana only has 2.4 million people less than the Garden State. Whether or not that makes a big difference is for you to decide. Another option I see is making the first round of the semi-state championships the ticket round.

 

If we were to eliminate Semi-State, following the New Jersey format:

 

Sectionals (1-2 day | Thursday/Friday, Saturday)

- 8-man bracket

- Top 3 advance in each weight

 

Regionals (3-day | Wednesday/Thursday, Friday, Saturday)

- 16-man bracket

- Top 3 advance in each weight

 

State (3-day | Thursday, Friday, Saturday)

- 32-man bracket

- Place 8, Wrestleback to 3rd (maybe 5th, and semi-final losers wrestle for 3rd/4th like at Michigan State Open)

- Seeding meeting four days before state tournament.

 

If we are to keep our state tournament system with a few adjustments:

 

Sectionals (No Change)

 

Regionals

- Eliminate first round advancement

- Full wrestlebacks to 3rd

 

Semi-State

- First round ticket round

- Place 8, Wrestleback to 5th

 

State (3-day)

- Logical pairings (Seed / Draw method instead of the random 1-4, 2-3 draw) | Semi-State Champions earn 1-4 seeds based upon best record, 2nd to 4th place winners follow same method. 5th to 8th fall into slots.

- Full wrestlebacks to 5th place (Possibly 3rd)

 

I see both of these methods increasing attendance and excitement surrounding the Indiana state tournament. The only way we can push forward with it is if our Coaches' Association's relationship with the IHSAA is as strong as other states around the nation. Just some thoughts.

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I could live with things being exactly the same till Semi-State.  At Semi-State you do a true wrestle back (including for second if needed).  At state you seed 1 & 2's and random draw 3 & 4's.  It would make Semi-State a touch longer, but make things much more accurate.  Makes for a long day at Semi-State, but if you keep 4 mats it wouldn't be that bad.

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I asked a person from New Jersey if they had a big discrepancy between big schools and small schools in terms of state qualifiers in their state. With doing the statistics for a few years here, I expected an answer that was similar to our state.  However, in New Jersey they do not have a lot of difference between their big schools and small schools. This honestly baffled me as to what we were "doing wrong."

 

Here is what I found

New Jersey has around 310 schools with wrestling, very similar to Indiana

The average size of school in New Jersey is 925, Indiana is 966...again pretty similar.

However, the BIGGEST difference is the standard deviation, in New Jersey it is 468, Indiana it is 747.  What that means is most the schools in Indiana are in the range of 219-1714, while New Jersey is 457-1394. Their schools are a lot closer in terms of enrollment and thus they don't see the drastic difference in small and large schools. Indiana has 93 schools(almost 1/3) with less than 500 students, while New Jersey only has 53.

 

One other factor is the size of the state. New Jersey is a smaller state, thus it is easier to train with elite clubs and programs in the offseason.

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I could live with things being exactly the same till Semi-State.  At Semi-State you do a true wrestle back (including for second if needed).  At state you seed 1 & 2's and random draw 3 & 4's.  It would make Semi-State a touch longer, but make things much more accurate.  Makes for a long day at Semi-State, but if you keep 4 mats it wouldn't be that bad.

I like wrestlebacks at Regionals too.  A first round match-up of 2 vs 3, those could be two of the best four kids there, but one gets eliminated first round.  

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The issue with the NJ Argumnent is SIZE 

 

NJ Area: 8,722.58 sq mi

 

IN Area: 36,418 sq mi

 

So the 2-3 day tournaments are an issue because hotels and travel gets expensive for some programs. 

 

That being said you seem to not understand how the IHSAA works. They do what they want when they want regardless of coaches association offering good ideas or not. (See Team State Weigh-In Waiver Fiasco) 

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I like wrestlebacks at Regionals too.  A first round match-up of 2 vs 3, those could be two of the best four kids there, but one gets eliminated first round.  

This can easily be done, because Regional is a total of only 3 matches now.  It would probably only add an hour or two, which would finish most up by 4pm.  With this being done, and if Semi-State was seeded by 1 & 2's with 3 & 4's as a blind drawl alone would be a huge improvement.

Edited by warsawwrestling
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Wrestlebacks will never happen as long as Bobby Cox is in power. It's already off the table for the current proposal year. 

 

We can go round and round w/ hypotheticals but it's like running into a brick wall w/ wrestlebacks. 

 

I do think there's a chance to expand the number of state qualifiers. 

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Wrestlebacks will never happen as long as Bobby Cox is in power. It's already off the table for the current proposal year. 

 

We can go round and round w/ hypotheticals but it's like running into a brick wall w/ wrestlebacks. 

 

I do think there's a chance to expand the number of state qualifiers. 

If we were allowed to have 24 per weight (6 per semi-state), we would no longer have any level of the tournament in which you don't have every chance to prove on the mat you deserve to advance to the next level.  As it is, seeding and wrestlebacks at sectional mean you have no argument for being top 4 if you don't earn it.  Because we only have two sectionals per regional, the only way you don't get top 4 at regional is by losing to someone at sectional or regional who you should have beaten if you were legitimately top 4.  Our only remaining issue is semi-state, where we have about 60% of weights in which the 3rd or 4th (or both) best guys don't get to prove it because of the system of draws.  If we advanced top 6, however, there would be a mini-tournament among the quarterfinal losers that would advance the those guys that right now are getting hosed.  Everyone who should be at state, would be at state.

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Wrestlebacks will never happen as long as Bobby Cox is in power. It's already off the table for the current proposal year. 

 

We can go round and round w/ hypotheticals but it's like running into a brick wall w/ wrestlebacks. 

 

I do think there's a chance to expand the number of state qualifiers. 

This is too bad, that our sport has became a dictatorship.  I understand that Bobby has more important things like Basketball and Football, but it would be nice (I know blue sky thinking) if they would allow each sport to decide or have an opinion that could be discussed and voted on.

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Wrestlebacks will never happen as long as Bobby Cox is in power. It's already off the table for the current proposal year. 

 

We can go round and round w/ hypotheticals but it's like running into a brick wall w/ wrestlebacks. 

 

I do think there's a chance to expand the number of state qualifiers. 

This describes ISHSAA logic.  If you dont have a basketballback, a footballback, a tennisback or even a softballback,  why would you have a wrestleback?

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This is too bad, that our sport has became a dictatorship.  I understand that Bobby has more important things like Basketball and Football, but it would be nice (I know blue sky thinking) if they would allow each sport to decide or have an opinion that could be discussed and voted on.

 

This describes ISHSAA logic.  If you dont have a basketballback, a footballback, a tennisback or even a softballback,  why would you have a wrestleback?

Much of the blame can go on how our state association goes about asking for wrestle-backs. About 10 years ago we were one vote away from getting them. Something happened that now they are 100% off the table.

 

Other sports can get proposals to better their sport to go through. For some reason wrestling has a hard time getting simple things through.

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We used to get 2-3 proposals through every year until we took the IHSAA's advice to focus on just a couple we felt were the most important. After that we've rarely gotten even one to pass. They were tired of listening to 20 proposals but at least we continued to get little steps passed towards better things. Maybe we should go back to lots of proposals knowing only a couple will pass each time.

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