blueandgold
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If the IHSAA wants to take a first step in the right direction, they’ll eliminate semi-state. Semi-State works for team sports because it directly mimics the NCAA Final Four, but as far as individual wrestling itself, it needs to go. The other individual sports in Indiana only have three levels: Swimming (Sectionals, Sectional Finals, State Finals) and Track & Field (Sectionals, Regionals, State). Wrestling needs to follow suit and then build from there.
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I agree with both of your assessments!
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This is probably the deepest weight of them all followed by 144... Quick Facts SIX of the top eight finishers from last season's 113-pound class return and all are ranked within the top eight. In addition to the six returning medalists, three of the previous year's 113-pound qualifiers return and all are ranked within the top 20. There is only a single returning medalist from 120 last season in this weight in Western's Tanner Tishner. Three of last season's top four at the 113-pound class come from the same regional. Questions/Observations With #4 Haines, #5 LaRocca, and #6 Ash all competing in the Mooresville regional, what is the chance one unfortunately draws into #3 Henderson coming in from the Evansville North regional? While #7 Tishner is an early favorite to repeat as a semi-state champion out of Fort Wayne, should he win, he could have a epic match-up with any combination of either #1Jendreas/#2 Aubin/#8 Dallinger or #3 Henderson/#4 Haines/#5 LaRocca/#6 Ash on Saturday morning (should everyone reach the tournament). Is there a chance #3 Henderson, #4 Haines, #5 LaRocca, and #6 Ash ALL make it out of Evansville? Is there a chance #1 through #8 all make the podium? Can any previous qualifiers out of the New Castle semi-state disrupt the battle royale in the top eight? #15 Taylor was a semi-state champion last season at 113, but he has dropped close matches to #11 Temples and #14 Rogers. With Taylor and Rogers competing in the same regional, what are the chances they see returning qualifiers #11 Temples or #20 Frazier in the quarterfinals at New Castle?
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Who is a wrestler from Indiana who may have recorded the best individual year in state history? I have three potential candidates. Jesse Mendez — 2021 Third Consecutive State Championship UWW U20/Junior Freestyle Nationals/World Team Trials Champion UWW U20/Junior Freestyle World Championships 8th Place Finisher Junior Hodge Trophy Winner Chad Red — 2014 Second Consecutive State Championship Fargo Cadet Freestyle National Champion Super 32 Champion Flo Who’s #1 Winner Jason Tsirtsis — 2011 Third Consecutive State Championship Fargo Junior Freestyle National Champion FloNationals Champion
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I feel like @Galagore and @Y2CJ41 and numerous others have provided plenty of those facts by giving firsthand accounts of issues going on in their schools and pointing to the increased participation numbers due to events such as Classed Team State or 1A/2A State. Kids will do something if they feel like they have a shot to be successful. Your school says you’re from Penn and I went to Perry Meridian, both 4A schools. Why does it matter so much to you that 4A schools need to wrestle the Churubusco kid with a 17-17 record in the first round of the regional who won’t make a difference to either of our paths to a state title or interrupt our point totals for a team title? Is it because by dividing us into classes, you’re afraid to start seeing more big schools taken out at the regional and semi-state levels?
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This isn’t total wrestlers on each level, but it’s 2023 NCAA Qualifiers in Division I, and Illinois produced over four times as many which I think is an indicator.
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I ask one question about class wrestling based on the fact that I’m moving out of state to Illinois and because I’ve been on the receiving end of a beating by a 1A team from a state that has been historically better than ours, and it got trolls like @M109R and everyone else in in their feelings. “How does class wrestling help kids? Omg. I like one state champion.” This thread being five pages long is crazy lol. Class wrestling or no class wrestling, Indiana still needs to find a way to catch up to other states.
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The sarcasm is cute, but this isn’t a class wrestling topic. Save that for the other thread, son.
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Per the title, I'm curious to know whether the high school season actually matters for blue chip recruits. This is a thing we've seen in Indiana a handful of times in recent years, and what made me ask was due the national success of Christian Carroll. Carroll only competed in Indiana for one full season as a junior where he won a state championship at 220 pounds; he was injured as a freshman, transfer ineligible as a sophomore, and later moved to Oklahoma as a senior. His Oklahoma State athlete profile has no mention of his state title win in Indiana likely due to his outstanding national resume which included winning Super 32 twice and being a U-20 World Team Member while being the #1 overall recruit in the nation. In recent memory beyond Carroll, we've seen a wrestler like Paul Konrath forego his final two seasons to compete nationally, then the Lee brothers would all forego their senior seasons to train early at Penn State. We've seen it in other states as well such as California where an eighth grade Aaron Pico defeated one of the best wrestlers in Indiana history in Cody LeCount in the Fargo finals. Pico would only wrestle one season of high school as a freshman where he won a state title; he would go on to sign a contract with Nike and Zinkin for MMA. Of course, Carroll, Pico, and the Lees are anomalies, but I've been quite curious about this particular subject and wonder does this help or hurt the sport at the high school level? Also, in my opinion, it begs the question as to whether there would be a widespread change if it occurred more frequently? And then when you take NIL into account, how does it really affect the future of sports?
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I understand, and I respect your perspective. I respect both of yours as well @SIACfan and @M109R. I hope my comments don’t seem personal or rude.
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I understand you’re preaching equality, but small schools need equity.
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You could say that about Indiana right now. Classing has nothing to do with it. For the past three years it’s been Brownsburg and Crown Point playing hot potato at Team and IHSAA State. In Illinois 3A, right now the dogs are East and Mount Carmel, but some years ago, it was Carl Sandburg, Montini, and Oak Park-River Forest. For a better look at parity, look at Indiana’s performance at high school national tournaments over the past year, then go look at the two states you mentioned plus Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania, and then go look at the data about how many NCAA Qualifiers and All-Americans are from those states, and then look at their classes… A lot of these kids from other states are outperforming us, regardless if they’re big or small class, and their numbers are typically pretty good.
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You’re not making it easier to get to state, though. Keep in mind, our semi-state level guys are likely state caliber wrestlers considering we’re the only state in the U.S. with a four stage tournament series. As I pointed out earlier, most states, including the ones who are better than us, have three stages that look like some combination of district, regionals, and state with full consolation rounds to ensure the best get to state. Indiana has an extra level without consolations, so a lot of your best wrestlers are getting stopped there. I’m not saying it should be easy to qualify, that’s where consolations come in, but our tournament is flawed and we’re not showing our depth. A lot of those small schools get swallowed up at SS.
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To further my point on this, Sam Tasseff was seventh string between TWO weight classes at Perry Meridian in 2011 and beat a state qualifier from the weekend prior in Mike Ham from Penn to help Perry win the dual 27-22 and push them to win their first state championship. That should never happen on paper, but it does because depth matters.
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You literally just said why. Large schools can produce ten times the amount of elite athletes than a small school can. If a small school wrestler has no one to wrestle with, but a Perry Meridian wrestler has three backups that are all state level, how is that NOT an advantage? Jacob Cottey in 2014 literally had both Ngun Uk and D.J. Brookbank as his backups. Cottey was a three-time qualifier and two-time medalist, while Uk and Brookbank both medaled placing sixth and seventh respectively. You think being 3-4 state qualifiers deep on the depth chart isn’t advantageous against a team like West Central or Churubusco?
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Because they did get better. They got better because they’ve properly presented their depth. Had they not, a whole lot of those teams would get swallowed at Illinois’ sectional level. A 1A team dominating a three-time state and national championship team, who was at one point ranked 12th in the nation, 55-4 is because they created parity and sharpened one another up at each level.
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So, if the cut was at 1000, would that mean AA would be like 1A, 2A, and 3A and AAA would be 4A? My bad, you might have to explain it to me like I’m dumb because I’m not familiar with enrollment numbers.
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Oh, yeah. I remember it too. We were beyond excited because he was only a sophomore too, but now being on the outside and getting a different view, it shows how much the little guy is disadvantaged, and if I were still competing I’d trade single class for classing in a heartbeat if it meant more teams got a fair chance.
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If the IHSAA were to revamp its current model to properly accommodate all of the happenings in our wrestling ecosystem to create more parity, here's what I would be interested in seeing: Two Classes: AA and AAA AA 1A/2A schools AAA 3A/4A schools Three-Stage State Tournament Series Sectional, Regional, State Sectional: The sixteen existing sectionals are cut in half with eight to go to each class; the top four finishers advance to the regional into a 32-man bracket. Regional: The eight existing regions are cut in half with four to go to each class; the top six finishers advance to the state finals in a 24-man bracket. State: Regional finalists receive a first-round bye, with Regional 3rd-6th place finishers wrestling first round. Full consolation rounds to ensure that the eighth place finisher has to win more than one match to be on the podium. Finals contested simultaneously on two mats for both classes, or they can follow PA and do AA finals earlier in the day, while AAA finals are later in the evening.
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I was at a school with so much depth that we fielded a JV team that was winning varsity tournaments and called them "Varsity 2" back in the 2012-13 season, a trend that has continued to this day. Small schools can't do that, and it's unfortunate.
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This would be interesting! I’m not opposed to teammates wrestling each other because you see it at the highest level in Freestyle and Greco anyway, and seeding is something I’m always in favor of.
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I would just eliminate Semi-State and create something like a Super Sectional to start the postseason with a 32-man bracket. Just spitballing.
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The success of the 1A/2A state championship is proof that the depth is there for Indiana because most of the medalists in that tournament were stopped at the semi-state level or were low IHSAA state medalists, yet were still placing ahead of or beating higher medalists or qualifiers in the ISWA state tournaments which means the talent and capabilities are there, but they’re being swallowed at semi-state by so many big schools in a terrible format. That last statement is for anyone who thinks small school wrestlers aren’t good or are weaker. Also, a reminder that, as far as I know, we are the ONLY state in the U.S. with FOUR stages in a state tournament series for wrestling. California has three (Sectional, Masters, State), Illinois has three (Regional, Sectional, State), Michigan, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania three (District, Regional, State), Minnesota has two (Sectional, State), and Ohio has three (Sectional, District, State). So, it is fair to suggest that most of our wrestlers at the Semi-State level are State caliber athletes.
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Small school wrestlers in Indiana are the small town workers who are pivotal to multiple industries but are on the brink of extinction because they keep losing workers to the big cities.
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So, if he would win at his 1A school regardless, why didn’t he stay there?
