HornetPride

This isn't actually how it works at the high school level. Participation numbers don't matter, only that there are equal opportunities, meaning equal sports offered. In college, "opportunities" is interpreted and applied to scholarships, which is why football is a huge problem with their 83 full scholarships with no equivalent female sport. But in high school "Boy's Football Opportunities" is offset by "Girl's Volleyball Opportunities" So if we add girls wrestling, we could add boys volleyball, thus keeping opportunities equitable and Football would then be offset by gymnastics.

This is very easily solved by adding boys volleyball

for Proposal 4, is this saying that 113.9=113 for weigh in purposes?

125 - Hildebrandt 133 - Micic (still technically eligible so I'm taking him) 141 - N Lee (champ gets to pick his weight) 149 - C Red (Rooks if we're being picky about weights) 157 - B Lee 165 - Tucker (J Lee is close and admittedly I am probably grading him unfairly in comparison to his brother, but Tucker got a win at NCAAs and Joe didn't so that's my logic) 174 - Washington (Dude was super impressive this year, can't wait to see how far he can take it) 184 - I got nothing though I admittedly don't know anything about the DII or DIII levels (I'm thinking either Hughes bulking up or Davison making an insane cut?) 197 - Penola (making the blood round gives him the nod over Davison for me) 285 - Parris

Simplicity and objectivity will always reign supreme when trying to get something like this passed with the IHSAA. Evening out school size at different sectionals will certainly harm some schools more than others (Danville being stuck near Avon and Brownsburg is rough) but for the vast majority of teams it will lead to a much more equal starting point.

A little off topic but I've got to think the 2007 NCSS 103lb bracket is up there for "best semi-state weight class ever". 4 unreal qualifiers, and a finals matchup that kicked off perhaps the greatest rivalry in Indiana history 2007 103lb New Castle Semi-State - Champ: Fr. Brandon Wright (4x placer, 2x State Champ, 2x State Runner-up, 2x NAIA college national champ at Grand view) - 2nd: So. Camden Eppert (4x placer, 2x champ, 1x runner-up, Purdue starter, 4x B1G placer, 2x NCAA qualifier - 3rd: Fr. Jacob Tonte (2x Placer) - 4th: Fr. Brandon Nelsen (4x placer, 1x champ, Purdue starter, 3x B1G placer, 2x NCAA qualifier) - 5th/Alternate: [My mediocre ass] These four placed 1st, 2nd, 4th, & 7th at state that year as well. I remember it distinctly because it was the one year of my career I was actually healthy and came into NC as a regional champ thinking I was hot ***potty mouth*** only to get absolutely baptized by Wright in the ticket round lol

This is an interesting point given how weak the FW semi state is overall, it is much more likely for small schools to have success and get qualifiers through, this seems like the closest thing to a "small school class" test case you're gonna get any time soon, so what do the numbers say? Are schools in the FW semi-state losing participants at the same rate as the others? losing more? losing less? gaining? If retention in FW is the same as retention in New Castle then clearly Classing wrestling won't actually solve the issue. If retention is significantly better then you may have a point. Anybody have the data on this?

If the goal is to grow the sport then why not let everyone enter the state tournament regardless of varsity/JV status? Seems like allowing everyone at Carmel the chance to compete could help them grow to a 100+ man roster fairly easily. That would go a long way towards increasing participation number. to be clear, I don't actually think this is a great idea, I simply point it out to make the point that you aren't actually focused on increasing overall participation so much as you are focused on increasing small school participation

I believe we are arguing the same side here though I may not have made my point very clearly. qualifiers mirroring population in an individual tournament should be the goal in my mind.

This isn't entirely true, Perry often has 3 year backups end up placing high at state as seniors but it's also definitely not entirely false. Hence my point, geography matters a heck of a lot more than size, proximity to good clubs is way more important than the number of kids walking the halls.

It has to do with population, its been a while since I saw the actual numbers but it's something like 50% of all Indiana students go to 3A (wrestling team state) schools, so it makes sense they represent 50% of the state tournament field. Yes, it is more likely that a state qualifier level kid will come from Carmel (2000+ kids) than it is he will come from Angola (~900 kids). But the chances that any randomly selected INDIVIDUAL will be a state level kid is the same regardless where they are from. It is an individual tournament after all, so this is not a good argument.

Zionsville's Logan and Kody Wagner did it in 2018

It resets after each official weigh in.