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Larry Dickman wrote:

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Here's an idea.

1st off, Flint Powers would be absorbed into the CHSL-Central.

Then (believe it or not), crank out a league like this. If you really look at it, this makes sense.

Here it is, then I'll explain the method to the madness.

Saginaw Valley Conference Red division.

Carman Ainsworth
Saginaw Heritage
Davison
Midland
Flushing
Bay City Central
Midland Dow
Bay City Western
Mt. Pleasant

Saginaw Valley Conference Blue

Flint SWA
Saginaw Arthur Hill
Flint Northwestern
Flint Northern
Saginaw
Flint Central
Flint Beecher
Flint Hamady
Saginaw Buena Vista

Sure, it looks like "segregating the inner-city schools from the suburban schools", but there is a reason for this;

1. The biggest complaint that the schools in the Red set up, is playing teams that really don't care about sports other than football or basketball. This set-up would allow these schools a complete and through schedule for many boys and girls sports. (i.e soccer, golf, cross country, volleyball, baseball, softball, etc)

2. The biggest problem between the Blue schools, is trying to develop sports other than football and basketball. What's the point of getting kids to play knowing that a baseball game is going to be 20-0 in 3 innings? This set-up would help the these schools long term with competitive balance and developing their programs to compete at a competitive level . Ask anyone who teaches in the inner-city, getting more participation means sustained enrollment for an entire school year. Not to mention, all of these school's enrollments will continue to decrease.

3. Why BV? Their sports programs are dying, simply because no one wants them in a conference.

This idea on paper makes excellent sense, but will never see the light of day.

Why? Political Correctness.

BV's programs aren't dying because nobody wants them in a conference. Nobody wants them in a conference because their program is disorganized.

For example, annually BV fails to opt-out of the Softball tournament. Annually, their AD or coach calls up the District host a few days before the District Tournament and says they won't be showing up. Since the draw has inevitably already been held, the schedule gets thrown off because what was once scheduled to be a game is now a bye due to the forfeiture.

A few years ago, BV spent an ungodly amount of money on a brand new track. Not just an 8-lane track; they went whole hog and got a 10-lane track (if the numbers are wrong, at any rate they got a track that had excessive capacity). Fancy high-tech surface (whatever they use these days), the whole nine yards. It goes largely unused, since they don't field much of a track team and at any rate rarely host meets/invitationals.

The West Division of the Greater Thumb Conference had BV as a Football-only member a few years ago when Valley Lutheran defected to the Tri-Valley Conference when it expanded and the GTCW needed to fill the gap on the Football schedule. The expectation was that it would be a trial performance for BV; if they were a "good neighbor," they would be considered for full league membership. Apparently they did not impress anyone, since they're out and Vassar came over from the TVC East. I can virtually guarantee you that the TVC will not be offering BV membership, since the league requires a certain collection of sports (Football, B&G Basketball, B&G Track, Softball, and Baseball are, I think, the list of required sports) to be considered and BV does not.