SC Soccer Forums SCSoccer.com Forums Girls Varsity Soccer Can or should Soccer have its own class in High School??

I would like to see High School soccer to do away with the current classes. I would like to see their be 3 divisions in Soccer with the top 20 in Div 1 next 20 in Div II and the rest in Div III. You can use the year end rankings from the previous 3 years and average them to start out with. Then update the Divisions every 5 years. I know this may cause some logistical problems but games could be combined into weekend events where you play multiple games to help with away games. The bottom line it would give HS soccer more Legitimacy and more competitivness. Players would get better playing High School becuase of the quality of play. Any thoughts or comments?

I'm all about that..That would do away with the constant bickering over running the scores up..

That would be a logistical nightmare. It is a good idea, but will never happen with travel.

Here is an idea. Get away from regions. Allow school to form conferences which they can decide (i.e. all columbia area schools could form a conference and then break up the conference based on talent level. or a charleston conference. or a york county conference. or a spartanburg,greenville conference). This would allow the better teams to play better in-conference games and weaker teams the same. Then each school would be responsible for non-region SOS. Add a round to the playoffs and let everyone in. Having an upperstate and lowerstate voting meeting to seed all of the teams and then place themselves on the bracket (aka NCAA basketball style). top team gets tope seed and bye, etc. This would also allow current regions who have 5 or 6 good teams to get everyone into the tournament and avoid the situation where a 1 seed (FM) has to play a really good 4 seed (Byrnes, Spartanburg, etc) in the first round.

Does anyone know of any other state that does this?

Ohio does. Conferences are chosen by the schools. Completely unrelated to eventual tournament region or size of school (4A and 3A can conference together). The state is then broken up into sectional of 14 to 18 teams based on division (4A, 3A although it is Div 1, 2 and 3). The coaches from each sectional get together and vote for the top 4 seeds. Those seed get to pick their spot on tournament chart. Everyone else is selected at random. Works pretty well.

Hobo's suggestion is nirvana.....but not practical. Clover at Hilton Head Island on a Tuesday night would be pretty difficult.

cid's idea is better. Conferences should be based on geography with some consideration for school size.

In South Jersey they have a Coaches Cup, which is very similar to the FA Cup. Single-elimination tournament runs throughout a good bit of the season. No regard for school size, sort of like the TB Viking Cup. We could do it here if we scheduled the games on Saturday so as not to conflict with the regular season and allow for travel (Clover @ HHI).

AAAHHHH, Hurst longing for yester-year of old. Hurst do you remember the NJ tournament of champions as well?

Yes I do Joe.

My high school team was never good enough to participate.

I agree with HOBO 110%. Our high school league games are like watching paint dry.

I believe Kevin Heise et al proposed a system to the High School League over 5 years ago that would classify schools by historical soccer success rather than by attendance numbers. As I recall, it went over like a lead balloon.

I don't know what the league's reaction was back then, but I could imagine that the other sports' coaches would say something like: "If the current class system is good enough for all of the other high school sports, why does soccer think they are so special that they need a different system?"

Maybe for the same reason we keep seeing "School X will participate in Region Y in every sport EXCEPT FOOTBALL..."

While we're dreaming, how about this based on the midseason Massey ratings:

DIVISION I
Upper Conference: Dorman, Mauldin, TL Hanna, Riverside, Woodruff, Eastside, Spartanburg, Greenville, Christ Church, Boiling Springs, Byrnes, Wren, JL Mann, Hillcrest
Middle Conference: Ft Mill, South Aiken, Clover, Spring Valley, Lexington, Brookland-Cayce, Dutch Fork, Irmo, Blythewood, White Knoll, Ridgeview, Dreher
Lower Conference: Wando, Waccamaw, Hilton Head, Bishop England, West Ashley, Academic Magnet, West Florence, James Island, Summerville, Myrtle Beach, St James, Beaufort

DIVISION II
Upper Conference: Wade Hampton, Travelers Rest, Walhalla, Seneca, Southside Christian, Belton-Honea Path, Easley, Pickens, Woodmont, Blue Ridge, Westside, Broome, West-Oak
Middle Conference: Chapin, Barnwell, Northwestern, Nation Ford, Airport, North Augusta, Gilbert, AC Flora, Rock Hill, Swansea, Aiken, Lancaster
Lower Conference: Stratford, Carolina Forest, Bluffton, Ft Dorchester, N Myrtle Beach, Berkeley, Ashley Ridge, Socastee, Colleton County, Hanahan, Conway, Sumter

DIVISION III
Upper Conference: Gaffney, Southside, Greenwood, Greenville Tech, Chapman, Greer, Daniel, Union, Carolina Academy, Berea, Pendleton, Landrum, Laurens
Middle Conference: Richland NE, York, South Pointe, O'burg-Wilkinson, Indian Land, Andrew Jackson, Pelion, Lugoff-Elgin, Chester, Lewisville, Fairfield Central, Camden
Lower Conference: Hampton, Loris, Goose Creek, Hartsville, Garrett Tech, Timberland, South Florence, Woodland, Burke, Andrews, Crestwood

SCHEDULE: Each team would play all of the teams in their conference once and schedule non-conference/interdivisional games to complete a 16 games schedule.

PROMOTION/RELEGATION: Each year there would be promotion/relegation of four teams between the divisions of each conference. For example, the bottom two teams from D1-Upper would move down to D2-Upper and top two teams from D2-Upper would move up to D1-Upper.

PLAYOFFS: The top four teams from each conference would enter a 12 team playoff system at each division level. For example, at D1, the top four Upper, top four Middle, and top four Lower would make the playoffs. The top teams from each of the three conferences and a wild-card with the best record would get byes in the first round. The playoffs would then progress to quarterfinals, semifinals, and championship rounds. So there would be a D1 Champion, D2 Champion, and D3 Champion like there are AAAA, AAA, and AA/A champions now.

I love the concept. The geography is not too bad either.

Of course, it's an athletic director's nightmare!

I'd take that plan--it would be fewer miles traveled than what's been set out for us over the next two years, too!

Of course--much like the agreement Region 7-AAAA has with Region 8-AAAA schools now; we play our region teams twice, the other region's teams once, and alternate years traveling to the other region's schools. If you make it a two-year relegation/promotion cycle instead of every year, like region alignments are now, that would guarantee that each away date would be reciprocated.

Coach P you are a genious as well as your plan, Unfortunately that is exactly why no one in charge will give it a chance.

wow you put a lot of thought into this. I like it just would like to see at least 8 teams from each division. Especially since each division has 15 teams. and it would only add one exta game

Good stuff P! Given that over half the teams make the playoffs now, I think it would be okay to put 16 in each division with either a state-wide seeding like football or 5 from each division with one wild-card...that would go to the upper division, naturally

This is good.

Talk to Kevin and find out who (or what committee) we can give this proposal to........so we can watch it get shot down.

...or take the advice of the all-knowing Hobo! 8 from each sounds good to me with the top 8 schools across the state getting byes in the first round. That is still fewer than the current system.

Personally, I think we take far too many teams into the playoffs now. My first thought was to only take the top 4, but after considering that, I went with 12. This proposal has 12-14 teams per conference. I think a team that doesn't finish in the top 28-33% should not expect to make the playoffs. Just my opinion.

Though at Westside we are generally in that percentage of teams not in the top 28-33%, I wonder about having fewer teams in the playoffs.

If less teams made the playoffs, there would definitely be a decline in lopsided first round matches. It would be more of an honor to make the playoffs. The season would end a few days earlier. I could go on...

On the other hand, in some professional leagues, the NBA, NFL, and MLS to name a few, approx. 50% of the teams in the league make the playoffs. Again, even at the highest level, there are some mismatches in the opening rounds of the playoffs. But if only the top 25% of the teams in the league made the post-season, imagine how many late season games would be tanked, players would quit trying, coaches would be fired, etc., because teams would know much earlier in the year whether or not they would qualify for post-season play.

This would be a huge change to the landscape of professional and prep sports in America. MLB Baseball currently only takes a small percentage of teams into the playoffs. In Europe, only the top 3-4 teams from La Liga, the Bundesliga, Serie A, Ligue 1, the English Premier League, etc. make the Champions League. Teams that finish 5-8th spot can earn a bid to the Europa League. But still these numbers only amount to about the top %28-%33.

Kind of like Americans preferring a happy ending when they go to the movies; in athletics, we tend to reward mediocrity moreso than in other nations. Perhaps it's because we focus on SO MANY sports. Perhaps there's something about a "feel good" story that is more appealing to Americans than say Germans or the French.

I think taking less prep sports teams to the playoffs would not be a bad idea. I also think it would crush the hearts of many a teenage athlete who dreams to make the playoffs (though those dreams may be crushed even more harshly when their team is pounded in the first round).

Finding a way to set up a series of matches between the top handful of soccer teams across the state in all classifications, and allowing these teams to meet in a central/neutral location to play one another over the course of the year in order to determine an ALL-CLASSES champion will probably be the closest we ever get to the ideas being proposed.

With the sceduling and organizational skills of coaches like Steve Lea, Kevin Heise, Bill Tooley, etc. (on the girls side), I honestly believe South Carolina could make this happen and do it WITHOUT changing the whole system.

Here's to the hope that someone really does take the initiative...

Lets be realistic. It is the same scenario as the expantion of the NCAA Tournamen. The state gets a big percentage of the gate from every playoff game. If someone is serious about changing the system then they need to go into it with that in mind. Make a proposal and set an official meeting with SCHSL to discuss it. Keep in mind that anything that is going to reduce money coming into SCHSL is going to be shot down. Take your proposal into with them but keep the current amount of play-off teams or if you really want to make them interested, increase the numbers of playoff teams. Look at the Big 16 in football. Every team gets in.
The state that I moved from allowed everyone into the playoffs. The first week of the playoffs were the district tournament (Region tournament in SC). The regular season champion and the tournament champion (team losing in the finals if the regulars season champion also won the district tournament) went on to what was called the region tournament. This was done in the second week and the two teams that made it to the finals of the region tournament went on to the sub state (winner played at home loser traveled). I like the idea of making the divisions more equal, but if you want to have a chance of change, dont take money making games away. Add more to be considered seriously.

Good point CoachCal. Of course, I really don't expect this idea to be taken seriously by the league or AD's. It goes against the system already set up by class/regions with separate class specific rules and region administrators to coordinate tiebreakers, schedule coordination, all-region teams, etc, etc, etc.... A separate system with conference coordinators, etc would have to be set up just for girls' soccer to get this to work. If you also implemented it for boys' soccer, the conferences would have different schools so there would have to be another separate system for boys.

That's why I called it dreaming.

You could still keep the same number of playoff games under this system. Take the top 10 teams from each conference and 2 wild cards to get 32 teams like today. I think you'd still have a greatly reduced number of first round blow-outs due to the fact that the divisions are selected by historical performance and promotion/relegation. It would make for more exciting playoffs since the first round matches would be much less predictable than they are now.