Daniels | District football fails -- for now

Dec. 20—The idea of district football is one Scott Hamilton has heard throughout his 30 years coaching the Unity football program.

With the concept never really coming to fruition, albeit for a brief stretch in 2018 and 2019 before the notion was voted down in December 2019. Like it was voted down again on Tuesday when the IHSA released results of a two-week voting window IHSA member schools had to determine whether a district football scheduling model will go into effect in 2024.

It won't. The measure was defeated by more than 100 votes as 89.2 percent of the IHSA member schools — 727 of the 815 schools voted in the highest turnout in more than a decade — weighed in on 14 proposals.

The one generating the most headlines, though, and probably brought out the large voting block, was district football. The measure saw 379 schools vote against district football, 272 vote in favor of district football and 76 vote no opinion.

"High school football has been this way in the state of Illinois for so long, I just don't think people are willing to change it," said Hamilton, who owns 282 career wins, six state runner-up finishes and was inducted into the Illinois High School Football Coaches Association Hall of Fame in 2017. "I'll be shocked if it ever passes unless something drastic happens."

Hamilton, who also doubles as Unity's athletic director, said on Tuesday he voted in favor of district football this time around. With one clear reason why.

"We don't have a game for Week 4 next season yet," Hamilton said.

Mahomet-Seymour athletic director Matt Hensley submitted the latest district proposal, with the backing of the Apollo Conference of which the Bulldogs belong to, along with support from the Big 12 Conference, the DuPage Valley Conference and the Interstate Eight Conference.

"The group who had worked on this had a pretty good indication it was going to be a close vote," Hensley said. "Although there's some disappointment, there's also positive takeaways. The IHSA has a legislative process. That process has spoken, and the sun will come up tomorrow."

The proposal would have made the IHSA responsible for scheduling the majority of each team's regular-season football games, with district games going from Week 3 to Week 9. The first two weeks of the season, under the proposal, would have allowed for schools to schedule games against teams that weren't in their districts.

The proposal was dependent on the IHSA setting up the eight classifications before the season started, with the hope of eight teams in eight districts spread across the eight classes.

"I'm not sure that our proposal or the idea of districts is the magic bullet to solve problems that exist with football," Hensley said. "I talked to several schools throughout the process and they were honest about how districts just didn't work for them. That 89 percent of the membership voted shows that there's some pretty strong opinions on the issue."

Hensley expressed optimism about what IHSA Executive Director Craig Anderson said in a statement upon the release of the results. Anderson indicated the IHSA Board of Directors has already had discussions about the potential of forming a football ad-hoc committee in 2024 to address "issues that are at the root of different football proposals seemingly being brought forth each year."

"They recognize the myriad issues in IHSA football are unique and can be based on geography, school size, conference affiliation and the traditional success of a program, which is why no recent proposals have garnered enough support to pass," Anderson said. "There is likely no singular answer to these issues, but the Board wants to explore the idea that a large and diverse group from around the state might be able to find some solutions that the high school football community in the state would support."

Mahomet-Seymour football coach Jon Adkins, who is in favor of district football, heard from coaches across the state about the district proposal.

"There were still some questions that a lot of coaches wanted to be answered," Adkins said. "The main one being, 'What does my district look like?' I knew multiple coaches who were going to vote 'no' because they didn't know what their district would look like. I think everybody knows that something needs to be done. I just don't know that everyone is in agreement or knows exactly what that is."

Stability is a word proponents of district football emphasize. Mainly when it comes to the scheduling quandary schools like Mahomet-Seymour and others find in trying to fill out a nine-game schedule if they are not part of a 10-team conference.

For Adkins and his Bulldogs, that means four nonconference games next season since the Apollo is only a six-school league. M-S has five Apollo games in Week 4 through Week 8 next season, but will play two teams from central Illinois (Morton in Week 1 and Peoria Richwoods in Week 9) next season, along with a team from southern Illinois (Highland in Week 2) and a team from northern Illinois (Sycamore in Week 3). The games against Morton and Sycamore will kick off at Frank Dutton Field in Mahomet, while the Bulldogs will make lengthy trips to Highland and Peoria Richwoods next season.

"Our program is at a point where we're not just trying to get five wins so we can schedule opponents that we can beat," said Adkins, who has led the Bulldogs to a combined 29-5 record the last three seasons that included trips to the Class 5A state quarterfinals in 2021 and 2022. "That means we're having trouble finding teams who want to play us because we're trying to find opponents that make us better for a long playoff run."

The 2024 high school football season will unfold like it has in the past with schedules made up by the schools and conferences. In the case of Tuscola, the Warriors will play in the newly formed Heart of Central Illinois Conference next season. It's the seventh version of a conference for Tuscola since 2006.

Once opposed to the concept of a district model, Tuscola coach Andy Romine supports the premise these days. The Warriors had to schedule four nonconference games this past season after the Central Illinois Conference was whittled down to six teams.

"Districts would have been good for us," said Romine, who has a 74-21 record in nine seasons with the Warriors and a Class 1A state runner-up finish in 2017. "I also understand every place in the state is a little bit different and some conferences have good stability. In our current league, we are an hour away from our closest conference opponent. That's not a great situation. That doesn't mean we don't like the teams in our league. It just means travel is an issue."

Paxton-Buckley-Loda coach Josh Pritchard, who has guided the Panthers to four playoff appearances since he took over the program in 2019, said he was in favor of the district proposal, but not upset it did not pass this time.

"I believe we would have still had a tough district while playing some Illini Prairie schools," Pritchard said. "In the grand scheme of things, I'm not shocked it didn't pass. I look forward to another new proposal with districts with more questions answered than this year's proposal."

That seems to be the sentiment, too. The district proposal did not pass on Tuesday. But don't think it's going to go away for good.

"I am happy it failed," said Ryan Jefferson, Arthur-Lovington-Atwood-Hammond's coach who led the Knights to an undefeated 9-0 mark in the regular season this past fall and a Lincoln Prairie Conference championship. "I do think it's coming soon enough, but for it to go into effect next year with so many unanswered questions, I think it was best that it didn't pass this time."

Matt Daniels is the sports editor at The News-Gazette. He can be reached at 217-373-7422 or at mdaniels@news-gazette.com.