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Wednesday, September 16, 2009
High school sports is 7 million strong
Quick … what high school sport has the highest participation among boys? Yeah, that’s an easy one: 11-player football. What about girls? Outdoor track and field leads the pack.
As it’s done since 1971, the National Federation of State High School Associations conducted a survey of the 50 state high school athletic/activity associations (including District of Columbia).
Here are the highlights from the survey for the 2008-09 school year:
Participation set an all-time high of 7,536,753.
Boys and girls participation figures reached all-time highs: 3,114,091 for girls and 4,422,662 for boys participating in 2008-09. Girls increased by 56,825, while the boys increased by 50,547.
55.2 percent of students enrolled in high schools participate in athletics, up from 54.8.
Swimming and diving gained the most combined participants with an increase of 29,967. Outdoor track and field (19,396) and cross country (18,193) were next.
Up-and-coming lacrosse had an additional 9,579 participants.
Texas remained the state with the most participants with a combined total of 781,000. California (771,465), New York (380,870), Illinois (341,763), Ohio (330,056), Pennsylvania (321,324), Michigan (311,277), New Jersey (257,798), Florida (242,356) and Minnesota (242,220) completed the top 10.
You can find the complete survey at www.nfhs.org.
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TweetWest Carrollton, with now-winning football team, applies for CBC
WEST CARROLLTON — We’re planning to address the West Carrollton football team’s 3-0 start for Friday’s paper, which brings up an obvious question about the school: Where does it stand with possible league affiliation?
Rob Dement, the West Carrollton athletic director, said the school has officially applied to become a member of the Central Buckeye Conference and should hear something next month.
Aside from that, Dement said the school is “aggressively and actively pursuing league affiliation as well as the possible formation of a new league.”
The lack of a league affiliation has caused certain struggles for West Carrollton. For instance, football coach Rob Berger said, players aren’t eligible for any all-league honors. And, in the previous few seasons, there wasn’t the possibility of a league title for motivation following a poor non-conference start.
This season, though, that’s not a problem. After winning just one of the team’s previous 25 games through an 0-5 start last season, West Carrollton has won seven straight for a 3-0 start to this season heading into a game against Greenville on Friday.
Berger, who was the school’s defensive coordinator before taking over for the retired Bob Brigati after last season, said he brings a straightforward view of the game.
“I’m a very basic football guy, blocking, tackling, defense wins games,” Berger said. “Every week I tell our guys, ‘Defensive line, you’re the key.’ Then the second key is the offensive line. That’s our style.”
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TweetAnna football celebrates decade of excellence
The 2009 season marks 10 years of Anna Rockets varsity football. For the Rockets and their followers it’s been a … well … blast.
The high school will hold a celebration before the home game with Parkway on Friday, Sept. 18. Former players are invited back to be recognized.
And there is much to celebrate. Including three wins this year, Anna — led by coach Bryan Rioch — is 72-21 in varsity football and have never finished worse than 6-4. Perhaps most impressive is this: The Rockets qualified for the OHSAA playoffs their first six seasons.
Got a good or favorite Anna football story? Feel free to leave it here. Having covered some of Anna’s games, the one that sticks out the most is watching Anna snap Covington’s 45-game, regular-season winning streak back in 2004.
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