SIACfan
-
Posts
844 -
Joined
-
Last visited
-
Days Won
8
Content Type
Articles
Coach
Teams
Team History
Wrestlers
Wrestler Accomplishments
Dual Results
Individual Results
Team Rankings
Individual Rankings Master
Individual Ranking Detail
Tournament Results
Brackets
College Signings
Media
State Bracket Year Info
Team Firsts and Lasts
Family History
Schedule-Main
Schedule-Details
Team History Accomplishments
Current Year Dual Results
Current Year Tournament Results
Forums
Events
Store
Downloads
Everything posted by SIACfan
-
Evansville Central Sectional vs Southridge
SIACfan replied to Jayruss's topic in High School Wrestling
There is a thread that explains why. It is titled "SIAC decline..." -
2023/2024 Indiana Wrestlers in College
SIACfan replied to navy80's topic in College and International Wrestling
This Friday OSU hosts Michigan. Lemley vs Mendez! -
If Thrine goes 126 in the tournament, does he become the favorite there? I would think he does. Has he wrestled at 126 any this year?
-
I assume you meant haven't seen him wrestle 126? And you don't avoid Hockaday at 132.
-
Unfortunately, I don't see this as just a one off year. But admittedly, I do not have a finger on the pulse of the pipeline. The SIAC used to be one of the tougher conferences in the entire state. As you said, they have been lead by MD for decades. But Reitz, Castle, Memorial, Central & Harrison are just not producing the same level of talent they used to. Maybe it is just a one off for Castle & Memorial. But Reitz, Central & Harrison seem to be in a decline over the last several years or longer. The addition of Jasper & Vincennes Lincoln should help some, but Reitz & Central used to have really solid programs & Harrison would always have a few solid individuals. I think the emergence of the elite wrestling academies has a lot to do with it. There is a bigger gap between the "dedicated wrestlers" & the "guys who wrestle". The good athletes that are "guys who wrestle" use to more easily have success a the state level. Now it pretty much takes a "dedicated wrestler" to even qualify for state. Maybe I am off, but that is how I see it.
-
Can Indiana ever contest for a big ten title?
SIACfan replied to Disco's topic in College and International Wrestling
There has never been a time when IU was producing NCAA Champs every year or two. They use to have AA's every year or two, but the last AA they had was 2017 (Nathan Jackson). The gap between the haves & the have-nots has been increasing for a decade now, and with the transfer portal it is only getting worse. -
Why would you call this a nightmare? Isn't it more a dream scenario?
-
All of this I can agree with, at least in theory. I'm not as sure as you that the result would be as good as you make it out, but it is possible. But it is also possible that there would simply be a handful of small schools that dominate. But at least there would be 3 to 4 sets of schools that dominate & the ones chasing them would have a better chance of catching up. But again this is a team thing not an individual thing. Iowa is a nice example, but as Y2 would say... They are such an extreme outlier that they totally skew the data.
-
Very nice & well presented reasoning supporting the need for class wrestling. For the most part I agree with what you have said. But these are teams issues not individual issues, and I have repeatedly admitted that small school teams are clearly at a big disadvantage. But I don't agree about the greatest factor of why large schools more consistently produce elite wrestlers. The greatest factor is that they have a larger population to draw from. When simply broken into 2 cases - large & small, the large schools comprise 78% of the student enrollment throughout the state. It then makes sense that 78% of the elite wrestlers should come from that enrollment. And that is exactly what we have seen in the percentage of State Qualifiers. It is true that large school individuals are going to have more/better in season training partners, but as even you eluded to in your second post the true wrestlers are training & wrestling outside of the HS season. And it is this year round commitment that is developing them into State quality wrestlers. The in-season training partners are a factor, but they are not the huge advantage from an individual standpoint that many small school coaches make it out to be. And the numbers bear this out. Again, small school teams are at a huge disadvantage - small school individuals are not. And the percentage of small school individuals having success bears this out. It is just very hard for small school coaches & fans to accept because the percentage is so lopsided.
-
Why? Team Champions would be crowned through the classed tournaments. The small schools would have their fair shot at a Team Championship. Plus the IHSWCA could still hold their Team State Duals.
-
I know that the IHSAA is not going to change because they view wrestling as an individual sport. But there is a simple solution. 4 Classes. Run the tournament just as it is today for each class except eliminate the SS step - Sectionals, Regionals, State. Then on the 4th weekend, when the State Championships are run now, have a Tournament of Champions. Bring the top 4 finishers from each class. Same amount of time to reach the conclusion of the season. It shouldn't take any more facilities either. There will simply be more travel at the sectional & regional level. Now we can move on to the wrestle-back debate!
-
These are good & valid points for class wrestling. But none of this means that an individual at a big school has an advantage over an individual at a small one in the State tournament given how it is held now.
-
Nice thanks! So Indiana ranked 14th in NCAA DI qualifiers in 2023. Slightly better than what should be expected from our population (17th). Additionally as I guessed, if you re-rank them looking at qualifiers per capita Indiana goes to 11th. 1. Iowa 5.0 qualifiers per 1 million in population 2. Pennsylvania 3.5 3. Oklahoma 3.2 4. Illinois 2.5 5. New Jersey 2.5 6. Minnesota 2.1 7. Ohio 1.9 8. Missouri 1.9 9. Michigan 1.6 10. Colorado 1.5 11. Indiana 1.0 12. New York 0.9 13. California 0.5 14. Florida 0.4 So as you can see Indiana while considerably behind the best wrestling states in the country, we are out performing our population numbers. And how many states with class wrestling is going to rank below us I wonder? Sorry but I do not believe that this proves beyond a doubt that class wrestling is going to improve our quality. Of course this does not include the entire list. I could only do this exercise for the short list that you provided. There are perhaps some states that are below us in pure numbers that would go ahead of us per capita. But again, I am not against class wrestling. It is needed for the team aspect. Unfortunately, the IHSAA is not concerned with that.
-
I'll give more food for thought regarding the Indiana vs Illinois wrestling talent. How many DI, DII & DIII wrestlers are both states producing on average? If Illinois is producing twice as many that should be expected. If they are producing 3 times as much or more than maybe Indiana needs to step it up.
-
Others can speak to this better than me, but Indiana ranks somewhere around 15th in the nation as far as producing top wrestling talent. We are the 17th most populated state, thus we are producing slightly above what should be expected. And I would bet that if you look at top talent produced per capita, Indiana would rank even higher. But more importantly, Indiana produces more wrestling talent than several states that have Class Wrestling with a larger population to pull from. To expect Indiana to produce wrestling talent near the level of Illinois when they have a strong wrestling tradition & nearly 2 times more the population of Indiana is naive. It is similar to expecting a 2A school to be able to evenly compete with a 4A school. It can happen but it is tough.
-
What you are saying has merit, but this is a small school team problem not an individual problem.
-
This sounds like a coach who is talking about the struggles he faces fielding a competitive team at a small school. I have & most everyone admits that small school teams are at a huge disadvantage. But those few elite athletes that come through a small school who choose wrestling as their sport of choice won't have any trouble getting the development & experience they need if they truly want it. The numbers that Y2 has provided show that small school individuals are performing at a rate that matches the enrollment figures pretty closely. According to Y2's numbers of small school enrollment percentage (based on 2 classes with outliers removed): -Small schools should average 49 State Qualifiers per year and that is exactly what they did averaged between 2008-2021 -Small schools should average 24 State Placers per year and they actually averaged 20 per year between 2011-2021 -Small schools should average 3 State Champs per year and they actually averaged 2 per year again between 2011-2021 I'm not sure why he provides qualifier numbers beginning in 2008 but only starting in 2011 for placers & champs. But those numbers show that the amount of qualifiers from small schools is exactly where it should be. The placers & champs do fall off the expected values slightly but not by much. This is extremely good evidence that the small school individual is not at some huge disadvantage in the State tournament.
-
That is a team issue not an individual issue. And class wrestling is not going to help/stop that stuff from happening.
-
I quoted you because of the statement: "Thor said it best - small schools and small school wrestlers aren't even playing the same game as large schools." While I agree that small schools are not playing the same game, I don't agree with the individual part of it. What advantage does a large school individual have over one from a small school? Practice partner? For the most part the individuals that are qualifying for and placing at state are not doing so by only wrestling during the HS season. Most of the wrestlers that advance that far in the State tournament are doing so because they have been training outside of the HS season. And many probably have been doing so before they even got to HS. Their HS practice partner is not what is holding them back. As I have said many times now the percentage of qualifiers, placers & champs from small schools closely resembles the percentage of small school enrollment. This is what should be expected. This doesn't mean that class wrestling is a bad idea, but it does illustrate that the small school individual is not at some massive disadvantage. The small school team is what needs class wrestling, not the individuals.
-
I have never tried to claim that small schools are on equal footing as large schools. In fact I have tried to explain the exact opposite. To think a school "A" with 100 students can field 14 wrestlers that can stack up against the 14 wrestlers from school "B" with 1,000 students is nonsensical. But it is logical that for every 10 state qualifiers that school "B" produces, school "A" should be able to produce 1. The problem is that it is hard for you small school guys to accept that on an individual basis, you should only have 1/10th the individual success of a school 10 times your size. Now the reality is some schools way out perform their numbers. But that is mostly the result of coaching, community support for the sport & proximity to these elite wrestling clubs. Once again, I am not against classing wrestling. I am merely trying to explain why it is logical & should be expected (on an individual basis) that the majority of qualifiers, placers & champs come from the majority of the student population. Now can classing wrestling help grow the sport & develop strong wrestling tradition at more small schools? Perhaps, but it is also possible that the same few small schools with an already strong tradition will simply dominate, & not much will change in the overall growth of the sport in our state.
-
I totally get that MD is an extreme outlier but when we are looking at numbers as they relate to enrollment size, you are screwing the numbers by not putting MD where they belong. Plus since you are dropping the top 5 teams you eliminate them as an outlier. But the problem is since you include them in the large school set, you are leaving the 5th best large school in the data that should be dropped. Likewise, you are dropping the 6th best team from the small school group that should be left in. This happens because you are incorrectly placing MD. It simply fits your narrative to place MD with the large schools. A proper & unbiased statistician would place them correctly & then drop them as an outlier but from the correct data base.
-
Lastly, I am not against class wrestling. But I am merely pointing out that logically the number of qualifiers, placers & champs should closely follow the school enrollment numbers. And Y2 has provided evidence that they basically do. The fact that a majority of the elite wrestlers come from the majority of the states student enrollment should be expected. The best argument for class wrestling that I have seen is that it might help grow the sport.
-
But you are making a leap by saying they would not have developed their program without class wrestling. We have several examples of small schools in Indiana that have developed very good programs that can routinely beat most big schools throughout the state. I know nothing about Illinois HS wrestling or this program you are referring to. So was this program you are talking about not very good before Illinois went to class wrestling?
-
First, you have admitted in the past that you lump MD & Cathedral in the large school category. While it is true that they choose to compete at that level, it is not accurate to include their numbers in the large school category when debating school size verses individual performance. Their wrestlers have to be included in the small school numbers for the study to be accurate in a debate of school size ability to produce elite individuals. Secondly, even with the MD & Cathedral wrestlers included with the big school numbers, those percentages are not that far off what they should be. Based on the numbers in your spread sheet for a 2 class system, small schools should get on average 24.3 placers/year and they got 18.8 on average per year. Likewise, small schools by enrollment % should expect 3.0 Champs/year & got 1.6 on average per year. But if you place the MD wrestlers in their proper small school category, those numbers are going to lineup even closer to the enrollment percentages.
