IF I were with the IHSAA or Crown Point (I am affiliated with neither), here are the questions I would ask as to the legitimacy of the transfer:
1. Is this hour drive due to a new job? If not, why is the hour drive now an issue?
2. Does this transfer have to do with the retirement of Coach Vlink or the new CP coach chosen?
3. What are the non-athletic reasons the family chose Portage. Let's be honest, if they moved to a school system with a so-so wrestling team the transfer denial doesn't happen.
The whole issue of transfers boggles my mind and goes WAY beyond the Morans. Transfers of studs happen every year and people express shock when the IHSAA gets involved. It's natural to label the IHSAA as the evil big brother, but somebody has to enact and enforce the rules don't they? What would happen if kids could go wherever they want every year? Don't you have to draw a line somewhere?
Big picture, I wonder how these transfer issues affect the perception of the IHSAA regarding team wrestling? It's the situation of the haves and have nots. Everybody in the Region knows Crown Point has benefited from transfers for the last decade or so. Now CP is no longer the "it" program, and it shifts to Portage. I just wonder if sooner or later the IHSAA says the hell with it and abandons the whole concept of wrestling as a team sport. All the issues that used to be relegated to college programs are slowly trickling down to the HS ranks. For Pete's sake, Bowman Academy (Gary) just a week or so ago had in ineligible player on their basketball team who NEVER attended school. The Coach, who is also the AD, expressed total shock that the kid hadn't attended school. How does that happen? Per standing operating procedure, he deflected the blame and threw someone else under the bus.
Sorry, rant over.