Front Office Football Central - View Single Post - Sweat Socks: RL HS Coaching Tennis Dynasty

Young Drachma · 03-06-2022, 05:59 PM

Howdy boyz:

We're back for another season, this time it'll be a full season rather than the abbreviated thing we had last year and we'll also be able to play for state...so there's finally something to play for beyond just District bragging rights.

Despite how much I talked up our team last year, we're somehow -- on paper -- better this year, because we were able to replace what we lost in the ways I'd hoped.

Before I get into the roster, there's a potential development on the state tournament end. If you recall from the earlier part of this story, the Oregon HS tennis state championship is determined based on points won in the state singles/doubles tournament for the 3 classifications (6A/5A/4A-1A) in tennis on the boys & girls side.

Well for decades, a cadre of coaches have been trying to change it but to no avail because the state association didn't have any real interest in doing something that might require more work, and also...fairness to tiny schools without full teams (which like...why should a school with 2-3 players be able to win a state title when the roster has 12?)

Anyway, the committee that discusses these potential changes only meets every 3-4 years and this is their meeting cycle. So I submitted the proposal I'd worked on with some other more senior coaches including the tennis rep to the state coaches association. Folks are skeptical that the committee will be open to these changes and alas, they weren't super mean about it, but certainly had two questions they wanted answers and asked me to go back and get some feedback.

I sent the survey around to coaches and there hasn't been a huge response, but the responses we did get were unanimous in favor of changing the way we pick the team state champion. I'm going back to the committee in two weeks and my goal this time is to get them to let us pilot this for the large school (6A) level for 2-4 years to see how it actually works in practice. I think once folks get a taste of it, they're gonna want it in all the classifications, because it's a really easy way to give a bunch of kids a chance to "go to state" and it's just adding a max total of 4 matches to the regular season schedule to make it happen.

I have no idea if they'll bite, but I'm hoping that using the data and coupled with a refined plan from the one we originally proposed -- along with some info from other states that do this, so they get a mental model for how it's actually done -- might make them throw us this bone. One of the data points I used is that because football has so many kids on a roster, boys are disproportionately able to "play in the playoffs" more than girls, even with volleyball existing as a non-boys varsity sport. Obviously boys tennis would get to play in the post-season too in this format, but it's still a way to give girls who maybe only play tennis but are 3rd or 4th doubles the experience of playing for something more than just a first-round lost in the district tournament.

I'll know more soon.

Next post, I'll get into our roster for this year.

03-06-2022, 05:59 PM	#33
Young Drachma Dark Cloud Join Date: Apr 2001	Howdy boyz: We're back for another season, this time it'll be a full season rather than the abbreviated thing we had last year and we'll also be able to play for state...so there's finally something to play for beyond just District bragging rights. Despite how much I talked up our team last year, we're somehow -- on paper -- better this year, because we were able to replace what we lost in the ways I'd hoped. Before I get into the roster, there's a potential development on the state tournament end. If you recall from the earlier part of this story, the Oregon HS tennis state championship is determined based on points won in the state singles/doubles tournament for the 3 classifications (6A/5A/4A-1A) in tennis on the boys & girls side. Well for decades, a cadre of coaches have been trying to change it but to no avail because the state association didn't have any real interest in doing something that might require more work, and also...fairness to tiny schools without full teams (which like...why should a school with 2-3 players be able to win a state title when the roster has 12?) Anyway, the committee that discusses these potential changes only meets every 3-4 years and this is their meeting cycle. So I submitted the proposal I'd worked on with some other more senior coaches including the tennis rep to the state coaches association. Folks are skeptical that the committee will be open to these changes and alas, they weren't super mean about it, but certainly had two questions they wanted answers and asked me to go back and get some feedback. I sent the survey around to coaches and there hasn't been a huge response, but the responses we did get were unanimous in favor of changing the way we pick the team state champion. I'm going back to the committee in two weeks and my goal this time is to get them to let us pilot this for the large school (6A) level for 2-4 years to see how it actually works in practice. I think once folks get a taste of it, they're gonna want it in all the classifications, because it's a really easy way to give a bunch of kids a chance to "go to state" and it's just adding a max total of 4 matches to the regular season schedule to make it happen. I have no idea if they'll bite, but I'm hoping that using the data and coupled with a refined plan from the one we originally proposed -- along with some info from other states that do this, so they get a mental model for how it's actually done -- might make them throw us this bone. One of the data points I used is that because football has so many kids on a roster, boys are disproportionately able to "play in the playoffs" more than girls, even with volleyball existing as a non-boys varsity sport. Obviously boys tennis would get to play in the post-season too in this format, but it's still a way to give girls who maybe only play tennis but are 3rd or 4th doubles the experience of playing for something more than just a first-round lost in the district tournament. I'll know more soon. Next post, I'll get into our roster for this year.