This whole topic is a difficult one. Between sport specific schools (with a half day of class and a half day of practice), magnet schools (there are a lot) and schools that have sport specific class (the coach brings in all of their program and has them in class 5 days a week for the entire first semester so they start practicing 5 months before everyone); you are talking about approximately 2/3 of the high schools in SC. There are only 2 real solutions, but the HSL will never do it and the sport specific schools would absolutely sue. The solutions...
1. Pull all of the above schools and split them into 3 divisions based on size. Take all the remaining schools and split them into 3 divisions. Allow regions to be a mix of the two and let everyone into the playoffs (except football maybe because they would be playing into January).
OR
2. Have every school submit a master list of every student that went through the eligibility process. Put schools in divisions based on the total number of athletes. The sport specific schools that require you play a sport to attend would have 600 athletes in a school of 600. I would guess that there are some current 4A schools if not some 5A schools who don't have that many athletes and the 1A-3A schools definitely not have that many athletes. Students can't play without going through the eligibility process and the HSL could put in severe punishments for incorrectly submitting a total athlete list (1st offense no home playoff games in any sport, 2nd offense no playoffs in any sport).
But like I said, some of the schools that think the current set-up is fair would immediately sue saying they are being punished. If you look at the state titles in team sports in A-AAA over the last 10 years, it would be hard to argue that the smaller public schools are not currently being punished.
It's all going to be a moot point soon when the state passes a law that allows any student to go to any school in the state. It's going to be the Wild West in terms of recruiting when everyone can do it.
