SC Soccer Forums SCSoccer.com Forums Girls Varsity Soccer JL Mann vs Wando Predictions

I hear violins playing in the background.

PJay,

If split in half both would be good high school programs. Summerville is nearly as large as Wando and West Ashley is not to far behind. Lexington is number 2 or 3 in the State in terms of size and Irmo and Spring Valley look like small colleges. I guess size does not give Summerville or West Ashley any advantage and only a little bit for Lexington, Irmo, and Spring Valley? Does Wando hold some secret other large schools cannot figure out?

Riverside was dominant at AA, AAA and now AAAA. As I understand, they are smaller than Most AAAA schools in the upstate but yet have a great quality program despite this imagined size disadvantage.

Academic Magnet does not appear to be hurt by small enrollment as they have walked the dog on larger schools at Viking Cup, Mauldin Cup and during the season the past three years. Hilton Head manages to win year in and year out with a small enrollment (they beat Wando in the past). They manage to defeat agree schools.

I am not citing examples from UpState because I am less familiar with schools up there. I only know what I read or hear. Maybe you should stick to the same philosophy and you might better enjoy your player's high school soccer experience.

Do you honestly believe that the fact that you are 1000 students larger than almost every other top soccer program has NOTHING to do with you going to 7 straight State Championships???

And yet again I ask.... split Wando in half and how many state championships do they win??

@Pjay

Did JL Mann win the AAAA state title in women's tack this year? It would seem under your theory, that Wando should have won because they have so many more kids to choose from, but they were 40 points behind Mann. Congrats to Mann on winning.

Wando's size maybe one factor, but I believe the club program with SCUMP and Champ's coaching are bigger factors.

If Wando is winning these state titles due to size, would you please tell the women's softball, tennis and golf coaches to pick it u?

I think it is a combination of factors.

Other schools have access to good club programs as well so I am not sure it is the club programs unless the ones in the Wando area are better than the ones in Columbia, Greenville or Charlotte/York County.

Coaching is certainly a big factor. Perhaps Coach Champ is the Phil Jackson of soccer coaches.

And size is certainly a factor. Especially when you look at the dynamics of how school soccer works.

High school soccer is dominated by club players. And club players require parents who are able to make the money and time commitment needed for their children to be successful. That also means that those parents tend to be better off and are able to pick and choose where they want to live, often living in places with better schools.

That is why the best programs in the state are dominated by up scale suburbs like Fort Mill, Mt Pleasant, Lexington, Mauldin, Taylors (Eastside) Hilton Head etc. The difference of course being that Mt Pleasant is much bigger than these other suburbs and you only have one high school.

So Wando has a combination of both the right demographics and you are much bigger than anyone you are competing again. That combination is why you are so dominant year after year.

Build a second school in Mt Pleasant and split Wando in half and you will have two good soccer programs, but you will probably not dominate the state like you do now.

Oh... forgot... other sports have other dynamics. Notice that none of the good soccer schools make much of an impact in Football??

BE won state in football pretty recently. Northwestern too if I am not mistaken. Had this guy Worley at QB who plays for Tennessee now.

With respect ...
If size is the overriding factor, why doesn't Wando win football and basketball championships?
And the nonsense about injuries NOT hurting a bigger school ... I disagree.
When Mann beat Wando in the boys' game in '12, I didn't hear a word about enrollment, although the concept of keeping and playing too many kids clearly impeded Wando's development late in the season.

Seriously???

Why do people continue to compare football and basketball to soccer???

Go look at the 2012 Football playoff brackets and you will see that almost none of the good soccer programs did anything in football.

Dutch Fork did good and Irmo won one playoff game, none of the other soccer powers won a play off game at Div 1.

Div 2 Northwestern and Greenwood did good, the other soccer schools didn't win a game.

Same thing at 3a. Hilton Head wins the boys state soccer championship, but in Football they lost to Strom Thurman who won 3 soccer games all year.

Same story at basketball, except for Irmo none of the soccer schools did anything.

That is because basketball and football are urban sports dominated by urban schools mostly.

But checkout Lacrosse or swimming or tennis. In nearly every case every top team in those sports are also good at soccer. That is cause all these sports are dominated by wealthy kids from the suburbs.

http://www.schsl.org/2012Brackets/2012brackets.htm

not to mention, twice as many mt pleasant kids would be able to play hs sports if they had another school in the community.