4A Swan Song for Wylie in 2017... Football Outlook

[slingshot]

Looks like the explosive (by West Texas standards) growth on the south side of Abilene will finally push Wylie up to 5A after this coming season. UIL could still pull a surprise and raise the upper 4A limit yet again if we bribe them enough (or ship enough students over to Cooper on snapshot day or keep enough high school kids home on that day or have a computer hacker change the count in the UIL computer or... whichever conspiracy theory you subscribe to). We graduated a lot of seniors last year and will have to re-load (again). Skill position players are talented but unproven. QB is less of a dual threat than last year so back to our conventional offense. Backs and receivers look solid. Defensive backs and LB's should be very good. Big question marks are the offensive and defensive lines. We will be thin and noticeably smaller than in recent years. Will have to rely more on quickness. Coaching staff has seen several changes but the core remains with head coach/OC Hugh Sandifer and long time DC Clay Martin. Lot of folks ranking us 3rd-4th in district will be sorely disappointed. I'll predict a 7-2 regular season and a run to the quarterfinals against Argyle. If can get past them a return to the semi's is likely. After that, who knows?

[lostaussie]

Looks like y'all headed up with LH. Kinda sad to be honest.

[Red Carpet]

I'm sure y'all will be fine. Aledo, Highland Park, Temple, Cedar Park and others don't know what's coming! And since Easton is out in Sville, y'all should finish a solid 2nd....not 3rd or 4th.LOL jk.....it is gunna suck! Won't be the same without you guys! Most of our match ups have been fun to watch!

[Dawgs]

Looks like y'all headed up with LH. Kinda sad to be honest.

Yea I agree. Sad to see 2 of the top programs moving up to 5a. For years I thought the old 3a was the best class in all of Texas. Schools small enough where you had that small town feel. Big enough where you had top notch athletes and big time recruits where we were able to put a high quality product on the field on Friday nights. Plus we had some of the best coaches in all of Texas coaching in this class. Think about 5 years ago all the big name coaches we had in old 3a. Really remarkable when you think about it. But then the UIL went and messed it up. 1st by splitting into D1 and DII. This really watered down the product. To not have WOS, Gilmer, Celina, Cuero, etc... playing with Carthage, Argyle, AW, LV, Ville was very disappointing. I know it might of helped some of the lesser programs, but overall I think it really hurt our division. Now it looks like in DI we have lost Sota and Ville as premier programs (I am honestly not taking a shot, and I hope like hell I am wrong). Now if we lose LH and AW, that is another huge blow to 4a D1. I am all for parity, and I loved how competitive our old 3a was. Still a fun division, but IMO it has lost some of what made it the best in the past.

[Yoe_09]

I was a fan of the split divisions when it was announced and still am today.

Using the numbers today, if you had a team at the bottom number 480 and a team at the top numbers 1099 you are talking about a 2.25x difference in terms of enrollment. The current setup that number is down to 1.47X difference. Even with the old system, a good portion of the larger teams were going DI anyway. This just leveled out the playing field more in district play.

To me, this system has the appropriate amount of teams per division without watering down things significantly.

You are probably going to get a perennial power back in 4A DII next year.

[Dawgs]

I was a fan of the split divisions when it was announced and still am today.

Using the numbers today, if you had a team at the bottom number 480 and a team at the top numbers 1099 you are talking about a 2.25x difference in terms of enrollment. The current setup that number is down to 1.47X difference. Even with the old system, a good portion of the larger teams were going DI anyway. This just leveled out the playing field more in district play.

To me, this system has the appropriate amount of teams per division without watering down things significantly.

You are probably going to get a perennial power back in 4A DII next year.

It has really watered down our division, especially DII. I could literally see WOS and Gilmer winning their regions every year. I do agree about the enrollment difference, but it didn't matter that much. Gilmer, WOS, Carthage, Argyle, Navasota (just to name a few) were never even close to the top of the enrollment numbers. All of them consistently best teams with much larger enrollments. When you are talking the difference in 480 and 1099 I agree that the teams at the bottom are at a disadvantage, but that is just the way it works. You still are only talking about 500 students. Look at 5a where the gap could be 1000, and heck 6a could be 2000. I respect your opinion, but I disagree. It has made for even less parity IMO.

[d0tc0m]

It has really watered down our division, especially DII. I could literally see WOS and Gilmer winning their regions every year. I do agree about the enrollment difference, but it didn't matter that much. Gilmer, WOS, Carthage, Argyle, Navasota (just to name a few) were never even close to the top of the enrollment numbers. All of them consistently best teams with much larger enrollments. When you are talking the difference in 480 and 1099 I agree that the teams at the bottom are at a disadvantage, but that is just the way it works. You still are only talking about 500 students. Look at 5a where the gap could be 1000, and heck 6a could be 2000. I respect your opinion, but I disagree. It has made for even less parity IMO.


It's hard to compare the 4A and under gaps to the 5A and 6A gaps. At those high levels, with that amount of kids, realistically, you just run into the law of diminishing returns. In other words, a 2,000 kid gap for schools that already have 2,500+ kids is less impactful than a 500 kid gap for schools with less than 500 students to draw from.

There's no perfect way to do all of it, and we all know that. Someone has to have the highest enrollment of a division, and someone has to have the lowest enrollment. That's the reality of it, and whoever is at the bottom is at a slight disadvantage. But good teams don't put much stock into things like this anyway.

[d0tc0m]

Yea I agree. Sad to see 2 of the top programs moving up to 5a. For years I thought the old 3a was the best class in all of Texas. Schools small enough where you had that small town feel. Big enough where you had top notch athletes and big time recruits where we were able to put a high quality product on the field on Friday nights. Plus we had some of the best coaches in all of Texas coaching in this class. Think about 5 years ago all the big name coaches we had in old 3a. Really remarkable when you think about it. But then the UIL went and messed it up. 1st by splitting into D1 and DII. This really watered down the product. To not have WOS, Gilmer, Celina, Cuero, etc... playing with Carthage, Argyle, AW, LV, Ville was very disappointing. I know it might of helped some of the lesser programs, but overall I think it really hurt our division. Now it looks like in DI we have lost Sota and Ville as premier programs (I am honestly not taking a shot, and I hope like hell I am wrong). Now if we lose LH and AW, that is another huge blow to 4a D1. I am all for parity, and I loved how competitive our old 3a was. Still a fun division, but IMO it has lost some of what made it the best in the past.



You hit the nail on the head with a lot of this, Dawgs.

I loved, loved, loved (old) 2A football. But I always thought 3A was the most entertaining division in Texas HS football, even before Celina made the jump back in 2002 (and again in 2006), and I thought that for all the same reasons you said, Dawgs. You still had one HS towns - for the most part - that built their identities around the HS, and, by extension, the football team. You had true small-town community togetherness and excitement, but with a really good/talented product on the field on Friday nights.

I remember when I took my wife to Texas for the first time, the biggest thing she noticed, as soon as we crossed the Red River, was that she could tell when we were leaving one town and entering another, because the color of streamers and painted hay bales changed. I told her that was how it was here. Every town had an identity, and you knew it. You felt it. You were a part of it.

I'll be so sad to see Wylie and LH jump up. I wish I could just hoard us all together, stave off the growth in 4A, put us all back in one division, and let us have at each other from now until Kingdom Come.

[jason]

Who's picking yall to be 3rd or 4th? I figure it's yalls to lose...

[Leopard4Life]

The timing to move to 5A is perfect. AW won't have to deal with 5A schools with 6A numbers. Since 5A is splitting D1 and D2 into districts instead of waiting until the playoffs. Travel will increase, but at least you will play schools much closer to your size.

[Leopard4Life]

I'm sure y'all will be fine. Aledo, Highland Park, Temple, Cedar Park and others don't know what's coming! And since Easton is out in Sville, y'all should finish a solid 2nd....not 3rd or 4th.LOL jk.....it is gunna suck! Won't be the same without you guys! Most of our match ups have been fun to watch!

The only school AW might face out of those listed is Aledo. All the others will be D1. There may be a slim chance that AW and Aledo are in the same district.

[briandumith*]

I don't want to see AW get bigger as Graham holds around the 700 # the chances of our two teams playing each other again will continue to decline...and that's a darn shame..

Sent from my SM-S320VL using Tapatalk

[Leopard4Life]

I just looked the the numbers reported to the TEA in October and AW is 3 kids over the projected cutoff of 1201. I have complete faith that AW can find a way to stay under. In 5A news the rumor is the Highland Park may be headed back to 6A.

[Dawgs]

I just looked the the numbers reported to the TEA in October and AW is 3 kids over the projected cutoff of 1201. I have complete faith that AW can find a way to stay under. In 5A news the rumor is the Highland Park may be headed back to 6A.
So if the projected cutoff for 4a D1 is going up to 1200 from 1099, then I would think the lower limit is going to go up too? The last realignment was 723. Do you have any idea of what that number will be? Carthage was at 754 the last alignment. I would think we will be very close to the same number as 2016. The alignment before last we were at 723. I guess Carthage could be headed down to DII. Nothing against DII, but I hope that doesn't happen. If for no other reason than I want to stay in our district with Kilgore and Henderson.

[Leopard4Life]

So if the projected cutoff for 4a D1 is going up to 1200 from 1099, then I would think the lower limit is going to go up too? The last realignment was 723. Do you have any idea of what that number will be? Carthage was at 754 the last alignment. I would think we will be very close to the same number as 2016. The alignment before last we were at 723. I guess Carthage could be headed down to DII. Nothing against DII, but I hope that doesn't happen. If for no other reason than I want to stay in our district with Kilgore and Henderson.

The UIL increased the number of 6A teams from 245 to 250.

https://sportsday.dallasnews.com/high-school/high-schools/2016/10/16/uil-opens-door-add-five-teams-class-6a-next-realignment-huge-effect-area-schools

That may or may not increase the top end of 5A. I've seen 1201 used as the predicted bottom cutoff of 5A.

[bobcat1]

Never fear, Wylie will be 4A The Uil will see to it.:taunt:

[slingshot]

So if the projected cutoff for 4a D1 is going up to 1200 from 1099, then I would think the lower limit is going to go up too? The last realignment was 723. Do you have any idea of what that number will be? Carthage was at 754 the last alignment. I would think we will be very close to the same number as 2016. The alignment before last we were at 723. I guess Carthage could be headed down to DII. Nothing against DII, but I hope that doesn't happen. If for no other reason than I want to stay in our district with Kilgore and Henderson.Hmmm... Carthage vs WOS? :thinking:

[buckeyebob]

But Gilmer is loosing numbers...looks like we may be Div 1 next year...in 3A

[Rabid Cougar]

But Gilmer is loosing numbers...looks like we may be Div 1 next year...in 3A

Oh goody. I see a Semifinal taking place in Waco happening.