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From our message board, the WIAA area meetings and the many conversations I ve had with many people, it is clear that there are some holes in the WIAA basketball proposal being discussed at the area  meetings.



This is my idea to fix the problem, to try and come up with a compromise between the two parties. 



I think even the staunchest fan to the private school debate can admit that it s not totally fair to paint them all with a broad brush and move everyone up.  It s just a means to move the teams they want moved up to move up.  And worst yet, the WIAA proposal doesn t even accomplish moving up all the teams people feel should move up. 



Fix Five Division Idea



An issue has been presented that smaller D1 schools have a problem competing with the larger D1 schools.   But by taking 5 divisions and dividing them equally all you do is create a new problem.   In the proposal, the biggest D2 school is 1124 while the smallest is 531.  Twice the size. 



Instead of a new D2 let s go for a D1A and D1B.  Top 64 teams are D1A, next 64 teams are D1B.  In this case the biggest school in D1B is 1342 and the smallest is 862. Seems more fair.



From there you actually start from the bottom, the bottom 128 schools enrollment wise are D4.  The next lowest 124 are D3.   The remaining schools are in D2, this allows for D2 to be tighter in enrollment.



This is of course before teams are moved up or down. 



Divisional Placement



The crux of this argument is that being in or close to a urban area is an advantage for a school.  I say there is a difference between having an advantage and using an advantage.  I also believe there has to be a history of success, not just one team that pulled it together and had a nice year. 



So here is my plan for moving teams up or staying put.  You take the number of games over .500 in tournament play over the previous three years.  If your team is 7 or higher games above .500 you move up.   This of course could be changed to 5, 6 or 8; but for now let's just say it's 7. 



So let s apply this to some teams. 



Boys, teams in bold would be moved up a division: 

Aquinas(5, 7, 5 = 17)

Assumption(5, 1, 0 = 6)

Dominican(1, 4, 3 = 8)

Lakeside Lutheran(1, 1, 1 = 3)

Madison Edgewood(3, 1, 0 = 4)

Milwaukee Lutheran(1, 0, 0 = 1)

Regis(4, 3, 3 = 10)

Roncalli(4, 3, 4 = 11)

Sheboygan Christian(2, 2, 2 = 6)

St. Catherine's(7, 3, 7 = 17)

St. John's(0, -1, -1 = -2)

Wisconsin Lutheran(6, 0, 1 = 7)

Xavier(4, 1, -1 = 4)



Girls, teams in bold would be moved up a division:

Assumption(2, 2, 1 = 5)

Edgewood(3, 0, 0 = 3)

FVL(0, 3, 0 = 3)

Regis(1, 1, 1 = 3)

Roncalli(3, 0, 2 = 5)

Sheboygan Christian(0, 4, 1 = 5)

St Mary Central(7, 5, 0 = 12)

The Hope School(2, 0, 2 = 4)

Wausau Newman(0, 1, 3 = 4)

WLA(0, 0, 0 = 0)

Xavier(1, -1, 0 = 0)



Waiver to stay in Division

There would be a wavier that a private school could apply to stay in their division.  This one might need some work because I might not have the terminology down.  But my basic thought is if all of the players on their team came from their parish feeder system OR are paying full tuition at the school the team does not have to move up. 



You may also modify this rule to allow them one player not from the parish system. 



Why not public schools too?

Another complaint about the proposal is that it does nothing to address open enrollment.  So try this one on, use the criteria on public schools as well.  Their waiver would be if they have one or less open enrolled kid on their team they do not move up. 



Well, I got a Badger football game to catch.  Thoughts?