Week #6 BIG 30 talk about the rankings

IHSFW · Varsity member

Week #6 BIG 30 talk about the rankings

Pop-Warner member

Love the Big 30....

I still think SHG and Edwardsville are ranked a little too high and East St. Louis is ranked too low.

Friday nights' Edwardsville/Alton game will be telling for those northerners who don't get to see much SWC football and can't see past the Tigers because they were the last team to make it to the finals from this conference.

SHG is very, very good, and should be favored to win 5A again. There are very few 5A squads who have the personnel to guard the skill position players the Cyclones have running routes into the defensive secondary every down. Put up against 6A-8A I think the Cyclones would fall somewhere around #11 or #12...

Great rankings!

IHSFW · Varsity member

ESL is good, no doubt about it. Edwardsville may have some weaknesses. I'm sure ESL does as well. The Tigers got a higher nod due to preseason expectations. Making it to the semi-finals, having a bunch of returning juniors & a sophomore or two, plus a consistent winning program and a good coaching staff, gets you ranked a little higher in the off season. How you play against your peers during the season moves you up or down. Cahokia is a good example of a team going in the opposite direction. ESL got a big test last Friday & pasted. We'll let the game against Edwardsville determine that.

Pleading a case for your team is one thing. I really don't even mind when people are complete homers, but I'm a big believer in the underdog and saying that 5A can't hang with 6 thru 8A just smacks me in the face.

Please, look back to the day when their were only 5 playoff classes and teams like Joliet Catholic, Normal Community who would normally play now in 5A or 6A was expected to hang with 5A teams back then (basically 8A today). So was SHG. The only thing that has changed dramatically since then in then number of classes.

Bigger schools, doesn't always mean tougher teams. Schools like New Trier, Lane Tech, Joliet Township & Morton from Berwyn, in respect by your logic should be raking in the state titles for football, They have a total of zero.

Not everybody wants to sit on the bench and wait for someone to graduate or get injured so they can get a shot at playing. Bigger schools often mean more sports and more after school programs. That kid who may have been a great wide receiver may have ran cross country. The speedy Defensive Back, could be starting on the soccer team.

I'll give you a couple of examples this year of teams that could play up a class or two and still have a shot at the title.

Both 5A Glenwood & Kaneland have beat highly ranked 6A Batavia & Lemont this year. Mt. Carmel who made the 7A finals last year and was in 6A the year before is in 8A this year, no complaints about them being at #3 after they had a tough game in week #1 against 6A Joliet Catholic, who isn't even ranked now. #1 & National ranked Lincon-Way East almost lost to 1-4 Providence in week #1, Providence might not make the playoffs, but if they did they'd be on the bubble between 6 & 7A. Cary-Grove is smack in the middle of 6A, they were in 7A the last few years. Would that mean that they would now have no chance at playing in 8A?

As far as even smaller schools go, I'll take Plano in 3A bumped up a class or two. Maroa-Forsyth. Put them in 4 or 5A as well, they're in 2A. Bloomington Central Catholic 4A, I'm sure they could hang in 5A as well. And if you played enough seasons with just one or two classes eventually, there will be a really small school that wins it all. Just like the Giants at Alden-Hebron did in basketball in 1952.

If you take away the idea of Rudys or the Hoosiers, that might be out there today. Than everybody might as well just stop playing sports and give the trophy to Goliath and deny David a chance to play.

Bones McKinzie · Freshman member

I dont want to get too much into this since I discussed it earlier...

but, there is a reason that Joliet Township schedules low enrollment teams... its to get wins. No, theyre not low enrollment powerhouses, but it suggests this equation: (high enrollment bad team) > (low enrollment bad team). Private schools dont fit in the enrollment arguement. why? false enrollments. Why doesnt JCA's team represent a cross section of the community it resides in? Why, if the entire area around Providence is growing and moving up enrollment wise, is Providence staying at the same enrollment... yet it has access to ALL of the kids in the growing area. To even make the situation more clear, with the split of the LW schools there is more of an opportunity to play for a successful program... LWE's emergence as a football power coincides with PC's decline... Football players are staying home when before they would have accumulated at PC in a low enrollment to win championships against LeSalle Peru and Roxana instead of staying at LW and having to go through Wheaton South. Wheaton South or Roxana, who wins?

Better example: Morris who is 6A/5A but plays in a 7A/8A conference. The only thing I would say to that is that those schools arent exactly football powers. And with this whole Darlington thing, there's a little cloud surrounding the program at least int he minds of those who follow.

-- Edited by Bones McKinzie at 14:25, 2006-09-29

Tiger007 · JV Team member

Seriously, I don't think no one down here can hang with East St. Louis if they continue to play like they did last week in Alton (without all the penalties). I was throughly impressed and wouldn't be shock if East St. Louis ends up playing for the state championship.

-- Edited by Tiger007 at 14:49, 2006-09-29

IHSFW · Varsity member

I'd love to see ESL back in teh finals. I love new faces just as much as I love to see powerhouses run a dynasty. Watching Driscoll roll through 5 straight titles was impressive. Seeing Joliet Catholic do it was also imprssive. On the public side watching Carthage dominate for a 4 or 5 years straight, sometimes with a title sometime with the 2nd place trophy was real cool.

Pop-Warner member

Maybe you should go see SHG play this season before spouting off some misguided diatribe.

I merely mentioned that of all the teams 6A-8A, I would rate SHG somewhere just out of the top 10. That is a very impressive place to be for any school. I don't know where you read that I think schools can't compete with other schools slightly larger.

Just for GP: Glenwood doesn't have a chance in 5A, let alone 6 or 7A. Put Maroa-Forsyth in 4A and they would be lucky to win 3 games. Put them in 5A and they probably wouldn't win a game. Those two teams I know about. Just like Edwardsville.

For the record, I am a grad of O'Fallon and Ilive in Athens. Those are my teams. I was just kindly adding a little meaningful content to your board on some teams south of Kankakee. Especially Eastside, which is potentially the best team south of I-80 this year. But hey, if you don't like it...fine, I am gone.

Best of luck.