After millions of words and nearly as many groans, class expansion finally arrives Tuesday.
It will descend in the quietest of ways, at boys regional golf tournaments throughout the state, and that is just as well. This is a switch you don’t want to think about until you have to, kind of like a Bears fan contemplating a Brian Griese injury.
It has been 20 months since the Illinois High School Association Board of Directors voted for a system of class expansion that has changed boys golf and boys and girls cross-country from two to three classes and girls volleyball, boys and girls basketball, baseball and softball from two classes to four. Boys and girls track is supposed to grow from two to three classes, though that temporarily is on hold.
It would figure that with growth would come growing pains, and they have. Two of the biggest headaches are in cross-country and volleyball.
In cross-country, the move to three classes has helped contribute to a mind-boggling concentration of talent in the Schaumburg 3A sectional. In a girls 3A coaches poll, nine of the top 10 teams will run at Schaumburg. On the boys side, it’s 10 of the top 15, and 15 of the top 23, if you include the eight “best of the rest” teams in the poll.
These numbers become important when you realize only five teams in each sectional advance to the state meet. In the old Class AA, there usually seemed to be a killer cross-country sectional, but the new system has made matters worse.
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“We’re on the bubble in our sectional, no question about it,” Schaumburg boys coach Jim Macnider said of his team, which is ranked 11th in the 3A poll but just No. 7 in its sectional. “The state meet will be easier than the sectional.”
The biggest new problem in volleyball is a schedule change in which regional and sectional semifinals and finals will be played on the same day. In the two-class system, semifinal winners had a day off before the finals. Now they may get only a short break.
Teams sometimes play several matches a day in regular-season tournaments, but they deserve an adequate amount of rest in a single-elimination event as important as the state tournament. A big advantage may go to the teams in the first semifinal, which includes the top seed among the four squads.
The IHSA has a simple explanation for these problems: location, location, location. It assigns teams to regionals and sectionals according to geography, not strength of teams, and its goal is not to get the best teams to the state finals but rather to bring in a geographically representative field and crown a state champ.
That explains the sectional at Schaumburg, which sits in an area dripping with running talent.
Geography applies to volleyball in a different way. The change to four classes has extended travel times in many cases, sometimes by huge amounts. Splitting semis and finals as before would force some teams and fans to make two lengthy trips, not particularly good for studying or — considering the price of gas — one’s wallet.
IHSA officials stress that there are no surprises here. Principals run the association, long ago approving geography as the basis for assignments and more recently supporting class expansion and a volleyball setup that condenses regional and sectional semis and finals into one day.
If we — meaning coaches, players, fans and media — don’t like it, all we have to do is get enough principals to change it.
Actually, drastic change isn’t necessarily needed (though I sure do miss the two-class system). The IHSA can alleviate some problems with a little fine-tuning.
In Classes 3A and 4A, where schools tend to cluster closer together, volleyball should return to the old regional and sectional calendar, except when long travel times are involved.
Sue Hinrichsen, the IHSA administrator in charge of volleyball, called that “an option we’ll look at,” though she added that condensing two rounds into one day appears to enhance the availability of officials and might make more schools willing to host an event.
In 3A cross-country, the IHSA should add a fifth sectional to split the west and northwest suburban area, which is almost always loaded.
The IHSA cross-country advisory committee called last winter for adding a fifth sectional, but that unanimous recommendation never was adopted. If it had been, some deserving runners who will be sitting out the state finals Nov. 3 in Peoria would be competing there instead.
Ron McGraw, the IHSA administrator in charge of cross-country, said going to five sectionals in 3A might mean doing it in 1A and 2A for reasons of equity. That’s OK, but there’s nothing wrong with doing it for 3A alone either because right now it’s not equitable for the big schools.
In the meantime, all teams such as Schaumburg can do is run fast and hope for a better system next year.
“We know it will be tough with all the ranked teams, but we think if we all run our best we can be in the top five,” senior Nathan Rutz said. “It’s just the first year of this, and they may get some glitches, but I’m sure they’ll work it out.
“It will be interesting to see what it will be like in the future.”
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*Read Barry Temkin’s blog, “Upon Further Review,” at chicagosports.com/temkin