13 coaches from some of the state's most successful high school programs share their thoughts on WIAA competitive balance issue

The WIAA passing the "competitive balance" plan in May generated plenty of buzz around the state.

The plan will use a point system based on postseason accomplishments within a three-year period. Programs will be bumped up a division if the point total reaches a certain threshold: six points or more during that three-year window will move a program up a division. It will be implemented for the 2024-25 school year.

The system counts four points for a state championship, three for a championship game appearance, two points for a state semifinal berth and one for advancing to a state quarterfinal or sectional final. In football, teams will accumulate a point for reaching the state quarterfinal level in 11-player football or the second level of 8-player football.

There is an appeals process for schools wishing to not move up a division.

USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin talked to some coaches who would be impacted by the plan due to recent achievements.

• Jeff Chew, St. Mary Catholic girls basketball: The Zephyrs won the Division 4 state title in 2009 and are a perennial contender. SMC reached the sectional final this past season and sectional semifinals the past two seasons.

• A.C. Clouthier, Hortonville girls basketball: The Polar Bears reached the D1 state semifinals last season, the sectional semifinals the previous two seasons and were state semifinalists in 2019-20 (COVID-19), 2018-19, 2017-18 and 2016-17.

• Brett Damrow, Howards Grove girls volleyball: The Tigers are one of the premier volleyball programs in the state and have won four consecutive championships in D3.

• Jeff Frey, Luxemburg-Casco girls volleyball: A Division 2 powerhouse that won three consecutive state titles from 2019 to 2021.

• Matt Klarner, Xavier boys basketball: A traditionally strong hoops program that won a state title in 2016-17 and reached sectionals the past three seasons.

• Ryan Klein, Wisconsin Rapids Assumption girls basketball: The Royals reached sectionals this past season, were D5 state finalists in 2021-22 and state champs in D5 in 2020-21.

• Bill Miller, Denmark baseball: The Vikings have won three consecutive Division 2 state championships.

• Chris Morgan, Laconia girls basketball: The Spartans won last year’s D4 state title after a finals appearance the previous year and were also a D3 state finalist in 2018-19.

• Sara Rohde, Green Bay Notre Dame girls basketball: The Irish are the top girls basketball program in D2 and three-time defending state champs.

• Chad Shimek, Brillion boys basketball: The Lions won the D3 state title this season after finishing as a state semifinalist in 2021-22 and also had a sectional appearance the previous year.

• Jerry Sinz, Edgar football: Edgar is a small-school football powerhouse and has won state titles in several divisions including 4, 5, 6 and 7. The Wildcats' last state title was in 2016 (D6) and they reached the D7 title game in 2018 and 2019.

• Mike Vander Loop, Freedom girls basketball: The Irish reached the sectional semifinal last season in D3 and reached the title game in 2021-22. They also were a sectional finalist in 2020-21, 2019-20 and 2018-19.

• Matt Verbeten, Wrightstown wrestling: The Tigers are annual contenders in Division 2 and won the state team title in 2020, and won D3 titles in 1999, 2005 and 2006.

Here are responses from the 13 coaches:

Jeff Frey, L-C girls volleyball

"I really don’t understand how this is bringing a 'competitive balance.' It feels to me like the schools that are playing in a division that they should be in based on their size (enrollment) are being punished for building a strong program and culture. Because you are successful on a state level, again at the correct division based on enrollment, those schools in many cases will be asked to compete against schools that are triple the size of their enrollment the following season after moving up a division. You also have to take into account that athletics have ebbs and flows and many times teams that have the success over a couple of years may not have that same talent level right behind those classes. Now you are asking a team that is not as talented as those teams that won at the state level to compete against schools much larger than them. I also am frustrated with it because I believe it will take away opportunities for athletes to experience some of the most amazing memories and moments that come along with playing at the state level and possibly winning a state championship. At the end of the day, we need to reward programs that put the work in to build sustained success on a year in and year out basis. It isn’t easy and it takes a lot of hard work and dedication from athletes and coaches. To ask that out of programs and then when they have that success you tell them now you need to compete up a division against bigger schools, just seems like a punishment for being successful.

"And that's my biggest thing is how can we pass something that doesn't affect every single school equally?"

Matt Klarner, Xavier boys basketball

"Generally speaking, I am opposed to punishing success. If you build a strong program or have some skilled players come through your program, it seems counterintuitive to have that success that was earned be detrimental to the success of the subsequent year's team. But at the same time, there are a lot of measures of success other than the scoreboard. If the goal of your program is to compete to the very best of your ability, then competing against larger schools and stronger programs allows you to test yourself against really good teams, which is very rewarding as an athlete and as a coach, regardless of the outcome."

Jerry Sinz, Edgar football

"My son, Jordan, was the head of that committee (that proposed competitive balance). It's stuff we talked about for years as coaches and obviously it would have affected us numerous times, because we've had stretches where we've been to state two years in a row then three years in a row then four years in a row ... so we'd have been moved up pretty much a lot over the last 20 years. But I think it's good. I think it's at least a step in the right direction. I can certainly sympathize with schools like ours — who are in small, rural communities of 1,500 people with 200 kids in your high school. And, of course, every year viewing the prospect of competing against parochial schools from fairly large metropolitan areas that have a a population base of 50,000 to 80,000 to draw from, then it doesn't hardly seem equitable.

"They kept adding divisions to help out smaller, rural public schools to get to state. It didn't work out that way. They have no better opportunity now than they did when they had fewer divisions. It hasn't panned out. And I think with the voting on it, from what I've heard, most of the schools that voted against it were probably Division 1 schools because they have nowhere to move to and they didn't want to have the Division 2 schools, which would make it more difficult for them to get to state."

Sara Rohde, Notre Dame girls basketball

"I don't think it makes a whole lot of sense because the teams who are having success now that will eventually move up a division may not be the same team when the shift actually happens. If it's about leveling off the playing field to give all teams a chance, unfortunately, I don't think that is what sports is all about. Success is earned and kids should learn what it means to work hard and be committed to getting better."

Chris Morgan, Laconia girls basketball

"I think a competitive balance plan was needed to level the playing field specifically with private vs. public schools. Although teams are grouped together according to student enrollment numbers, the demographics of public vs. private is very different. Public schools are required to take every student within their school boundaries while private schools are able to pick and choose from the students that apply to go to their school. These schools are often located within large communities where they are able to draw from a very substantial student base but the school ends up with an enrollment that matches them with smaller, rural schools. I feel that socioeconomic factors also play an important part of this competitive imbalance.

"As far as the competitive balance that passed, I feel it is a very flawed system. In our specific case, we are a completely homegrown team that has had all of our kids in our community since 4K. We love challenging ourselves by playing teams from higher divisions. When it comes to tournament time, however, we should be competing against schools that are of similar size. We have already accumulated seven competitive points from the past two seasons. That will automatically bump us up for the 2024-25 school year.

"The other thing that makes this a flawed system is that the classes in the years after a great group will be the ones that pay the price for their predecessors' success. We have a very successful 2025 group, but the 2026 and 2027 groups will be the ones that will really have the more difficult road. I understand that there is an appeal process, but I guess we will have to see how that process plays out."

Jeff Chew, St. Mary Catholic girls basketball

"The competitive balance to me is like, OK, not many of our kids come in from outside programs. It’s like OK, we built a program, we’re in-house, we don’t go out and get kids from different cities and things of that nature, which I know is part of the thing they’re trying to balance. Whether it be public schools, there are kids who leave and go to a better basketball school to play basketball. And they’re good for a couple of years and they go to a different school. The competitive balance to me is kind of like penalizing good programs that do things right, but I mean you do have the dominant teams that a Notre Dame — could they have won D1? Good chance the last few years. But a state appearance is a state appearance to me.

"When you have kids graduate, then all of a sudden you’re not good for a couple of years and those are the kids that have to play up. I get it that you need some kind of criteria, but if you’re good you’re not penalizing the team when they’re good, you’re doing it when they’re down."

Mike Vander Loop, Freedom girls basketball

"I don’t like it. It doesn’t serve, to me, the smaller-town public schools. It doesn’t serve very well for us. The emphasis was competitive equity and I get it, to make everything balanced. But the bigger question over many years was the private schools and people have been complaining and asking to consider the advantages that the private schools seem to have, especially the private schools in the larger areas. The larger private schools located in more populated areas appeared to have an advantage because they can pull from larger populations. That’s my take on it. And representation at state tournaments leans heavily to private schools, if we’re talking about making it more competitively balanced. I think that’s been the direction that we need to move in. Several states in our region added that multiplier, added it several years ago. I know Wisconsin has talked about it on several occasions over the the last 10 years, but it didn’t happen and I don’t understand why it didn’t. The number of private schools that we have in the state compared to how they’re represented at the state tournament, it's certainly skewed. So I would have liked something to have been done with a multiplier many years ago. I don’t know why the WIAA shied away from that. Now they’re doing this competitive balance and having successful schools that are traditionally successful — there are many out there to take all sports in account — when you have those smaller schools penalized and forced to move up, it doesn’t make sense to me."

Chad Shimek, Brillion boys basketball

"If we were to move up a level, we would be in a bracket with teams like Ashwaubenon, Menasha and West De Pere. Those schools are either close to 1,000 or over 1,000 for school enrollment. I don't see how putting Brillion, with the enrollment of 350, in with those schools solves a competitive balance problem. It just doesn't feel right."

Brett Damrow, Howards Grove girls volleyball

"I was surprised. And, to be honest, I wasn’t paying too much attention to it because I didn’t think it would pass because it doesn’t affect all divisions. That was what surprised me the most. In Division 1, you have your Kimberly, Appleton North and Burlington, Oconomowoc, Arrowhead — all these schools and it will never, ever affect them. That’s my biggest shock. That doesn’t make sense to me. And that was the one question I had when I made phone calls — why? You can have an Arrowhead or Kimberly football or whatever and they can just (win) year after year after year. And if we’re trying to develop a competitive balance for kids that are transferring with something like this, well they have the best opportunity for kids to transfer because they’re in the middle of an area where you have five D1 schools in a 20-mile area and kids can have school choice. So that’s what shocks me. I guess it’s a disappointing thing more than anything. It doesn’t affect everybody. It really hurts the Division 2, 3 and 4 (in volleyball). And that’s my biggest takeaway."

Bill Miller, Denmark baseball

"I wasn’t really surprised that it finally passed. They’ve been working on something for about 15 years. Way back then they were going to do the multipliers with the parochial schools and private schools and it’s been an ongoing thing and they finally came out with something that passed and I’m not sure if this is the best solution. For example, could bring us up if it was in place, would be Division 1. And that would be players playing Division 1 that had nothing to do with winning the last couple of state championships. I don’t want to say it’s punishing them, but it’s directly impacting players that had anything to do with it. The appeal processes, I’m not sure how it’s going to be determined. Who is going to make that decision if there’s an appeal going up a division, but they don’t really go into what it all means? And you can’t make any sense out of that."

Ryan Klein, Assumption girls basketball

"I haven’t looked at the competitive balance proposal very closely, but I do feel like there is merit to challenging programs that are successful in lower divisions to try their luck in higher divisions. I know that with small numbers, a program can fall off quickly if the talent pool dries up. It could lead to some teams being punished for the success of an entirely different group of players. Aside from that, I don’t see many issues. If the team is returning a bunch of the same players from the previous successful season, then that school may be happy to compete in a different division."

A.C. Clouthier, Hortonville girls basketball

"I think it truly does affect us in the long run, but at the same time there's nowhere for us to go. We can’t go up or go down. So imagine a (Division 1) sectional with Notre Dame, Kimberly, Kaukauna, Neenah and Hortonville. I just think it’s kind of disappointing in one way and punishing teams for being successful. It’s only truly helping the smaller divisions. I don’t think it balances it out competitive other than the smaller fields in my opinion."

Matt Verbeten, Wrightstown wrestling

"I'm not sure what's really driving this, but Freedom, Luxemburg-Casco and us are looking at competing against Kaukauna, Bay Port, Kimberly, Pulaski, those types of teams from around the area. I don't know what is driving this. Years ago, they had talked about teams moving up and depending on the size of your population that your school was in. There was something like that. I just don't think it's needed in wrestling. I don't see the powerhouse being built from outside of their own communities as much in wrestling. If they are, it's in the bigger cities where they go.

"My opinion is that we just need to get better. We moved up from D3 to D2 and we had to get better. We had to find a way to improve our program and get better. If we move up to D1, we have to find a way to beat Kaukauna and that's on me and my job and my program to be able to do that."

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This article originally appeared on Appleton Post-Crescent: High school coaches weigh in on WIAA competitive balance debate