Commentary
Gaming the System: the Timpview Problem
By Dave Stott
Summer 2008
Standing on the sidelines at the conclusion of Timpview’s lopsided 50-7 win in the 4A state championship and watching as several boisterous Timpview players strutted across the field, lifted their jerseys, and gestured gangsta style at the Pine View fans, I wondered how a game between two undefeated teams could turn out this way. Pine View had run off thirteen straight wins coming into the game and had beaten a good Sky View team 55-24 a week earlier in the semis. Clearly there was more than luck involved in Pine View’s season. Pine View had earned its way to the top. So, what happened?
It was not all Timpview. Its defense was extraordinary, but Pine View did not play well. Quarterback Nick Marinko had a nightmare performance with four interceptions against Timpview after leading 4A in passing all season long. He had his confidence shaken by a quick turnover on the first series and struggled the rest of the game. The team’s nose guard and most dominant defensive player, Taylor Harris, was ineligible for the game, and its middle linebacker Adam Bangerter came into the game hurt and hobbling. Maybe it was just that simple: Pine View had some bad luck and a bad game.
But the thought kept nagging at me that none of that would have changed the outcome, only the scoring differential. Why? The answer was quite simple. The Timpview team was loaded from top to bottom with quality athletes. As I checked off each position, I could not say for sure that any Pine View player could have started for Timpview. In a few cases it would be close, but not clear cut.
Clearly I was not the only one who thought Timpview was extraordinarily well stocked. Timpview fans were telling anyone who would listen that their team was as good as some college teams and the best in the history of Utah prep football. Were they delusional?
Evidently not. According to my sources seven (some Timpview fans were claiming nine) members of Timpview’s 2007 football team have received or will receive Division One college scholarship offers. In contrast, Pine View’s 2007 team, the state runner up in 4A, received none.
Let’s put this in perspective. Timpview’s program in 2007 turned out D1 football scholarship players in numbers that compare with national powerhouses like Concord De La Salle, regarded generally as the best high school program in the country. In 2007 state champions in football across the nation averaged one D1 scholarship per team, and Timpview had seven. It goes without saying that Timpview was offered more D1 scholarships than 5A champion Alta, which has a much larger student body.
If you find yourself asking the question, what are the odds, you are not alone. Is it really possible that the athletic stockpile of Utah’s top 4A team just happens to be that much deeper than the next best 4A team, or any other team in the state for that matter? Is the athletic gene pool in the Timpview area just that much better?
What are the odds that if you took a group of 1400 high school kids in Provo, Utah at random, you could come up with a football team with seven D1 scholarship players? If you said slim and none, you would be right. Except in fiction, a stockpile of athletic talent this deep at a Utah high school with 1400 kids comes about in only one way: talented out-of-boundary players must come and play for you.
Now if anyone wants to suggest that recruiting is the only possible way you get a whole bunch of out-of-boundary athletes on your roster at one time, the Timpview faithful led by its principal will immediately shout you down. And, in fairness it has to be said that no one has ever demonstrated to the satisfaction of the UHSAA that Timpview actively recruits these talented outsiders.
But, if they are not recruited, then how do they all end up at Timpview? Are we talking here about an Encounter of the Third Kind in which a mystical musical sequence draws them inexorably to Timpview's playing field? Apparently Timpview officials think so.
Recruiting or no, the fact remains that Timpview had a powerhouse in 2007 built on out-of-boundary athletes. Am I making this stuff up? Apart from the constant rumors, which are nothing but hearsay, and occasional comments from former Timpview players or their parents, which are not, in 2007 officials from Provo High School produced documentation at a UHSAA hearing in direct support of their claim that Timpview was siphoning off some of the best football players in the region.
According to these officials, Timpview had on its roster 22 (TWENTY TWO) players whose addresses were (or had been) outside Timpview boundaries. The UHSAA had no interest in that fact, however, and the hearing focused instead on the issue of whether or not the athletes had been recruited. The Timpview principal, who by the way sits on the governing board of the UHSAA, responded by producing affidavits from the parents and players stating that the athletes had not been recruited...a bit self serving to say the least.
Despite the UHSAA’s focus on recruiting, the issue is NOT recruiting. The issue is the competitive imbalance caused by one school, in this case Timpview, having on its roster 22 (or more according to some sources) players from outside its boundaries, athletes who under normal circumstances would be competing for other schools.
In case anyone wonders, this athletic migration does have long term consequences. As reported in the media, there are some areas of the country (e.g. in Washington D.C.) where the migration of athletes has destroyed competitive balance and wiped out entire high school football programs. Some think it may be happening in Provo.
So, how does Timpview come by these athletes? One can only speculate. Some detractors claim that Timpview brings in athletes BYU is looking at to finish high school in Provo. Others say Timpview actually assigns coaches to pick up players in surrounding communities and bring them to class at Timpview.
A 2005 legislative audit of the UHSAA pointed out that athletes may reach a high school outside their residential boundary by attending a feeder school in the district pursuant to the open enrollment law and the UHSAA’s first entry rule. Although school districts do have the ability and discretion to prevent that, it is perfectly kosher in the Provo School District, as I understand it, and Timpview would not be required to report those athletes as outsiders.
Others may have arrived at Timpview through later transfer under one or more of the highly subjective transfer rule exceptions (e.g. hardship or academics). Some may be the sons of Timpview coaches or other school employees and subject to exception. Still others may have transferred and lost a year of eligibility in order to play for Timpview. Finally, some may have moved with their parents and established permanent residence within Timpview boundaries.
Timpview supporters and sympathizers often argue that all of those avenues are open to every school. That, however, is simply not true. Washington County schools Pine View, Dixie and Snow Canyon, for example, all competitors with Timpview in 4A, must with rare exception make do with a closed system and in-boundary athletes.
With the exception of Desert Hills High School, which came on line in 2008 under capacity, enrollment in Washington County is closed, and kids at the feeder schools in Washington County may not attend a high school outside their residential boundaries and escape notice. According to district policy—and it is the right policy—any middle school student who wishes to attend a high school outside his residential boundary must apply for a transfer and convince the district and the UHSAA that the transfer is for reasons other than athletics.
The bottom line is that Pine View competed in the 4A state championship game against Timpview last year without benefit of ANY out-of-boundary players, while Timpview had 22. Did Timpview have a competitive advantage? It is difficult to construct a reasonable argument that it did not. Pine View was forced to play its better athletes on both sides of the ball, while Timpview platooned.
How much more competitive might the game have been if Pine View had been allowed to add players from Dixie, Snow Canyon, Hurricane and Cedar for the Timpview game? Could any reasonable person argue that filling in the gaps with players like BYU bound Adam Timo from Snow Canyon or Nate Carter from Dixie or any of the other talented athletes from other region schools would have made no difference in that game?
Better still, simply require Timpview to play the game without outside athletes; different result? Come on. Is the Pope a Catholic?
The upshot is simply this: the competitive balance will be lost not only in Provo, but overall in 4A if this kind of thing is allowed to continue, and it will continue as long as Timpview or any school is allowed to play significant numbers of non-resident athletes. What Timpview gains, someone else loses…it is a zero sum game.
It would be naïve to think that Timpview will give up its advantage, so long as it can maintain that advantage without penalty. Rules or legislation need to be put in place that level the playing field and eliminate out-of-boundary participation except in the narrowest of circumstances (e.g when a school does not provide an athletic program). The rules should have teeth and be enforced. In the interest of the game's integrity and fairness to all the student athletes it really has to be done.
Created: Wed 23 Jul 2008 - Updated: Tue 26 Aug 2008
Region Nine Mess Now In Place Until 2013
By Dave Stott
June 2008
Following my February 2008 comment (below) about the UHSAA Board of Trustees' (BOT) first draft proposal for realignment, the BOT issued its final realignment decision, and for the Dixie, Pine View and Snow Canyon football teams it was not good news.
At its final meeting on realignment, the BOT got the chance to fix the Region Nine mess when BOT member, Wes Christiansen, a former football coach at Hurricane and a member of the Washington County School Board, made a last minute pitch to his fellow trustees to include all of the St. George schools, Hurricane and the Cedar City schools in the same 3A region. More or less Christiansen was asking the BOT to reconstitute the old Region Nine based on the school board’s promise that all of the schools would have about the same number of students and be under the 4A threshold.
Coming from Christiansen, the proposal must have seemed surreal, because Christiansen is rumored to have been behind the unprecedented 2007 mid-term realignment that sent Dixie, Pine View and Snow Canyon to 4A in the first place. Be that as it may, his proposal to the BOT had real merit, because it would have evened up the student numbers at Region Nine schools, kept long-running rivalries intact, eliminated scheduling problems, cut travel expenses, made all of Region Nine’s games meaningful and restored full playoff opportunities to Region Nine members. This was a “no-brainer” folks, so what did the BOT do? It voted the proposal down and added to its reputation for politically based decision making.
How do Dixie, Pine View and Snow Canyon lose in this realignment? Simple. First, no matter how you slice it, for them this is nothing more than a three team region dressed up to look like a seven team region. For them only two regular season games will have any meaning, because those two games (the ones with each other) will determine who goes to the playoffs. All three of these teams consistently compete and produce winning records, but every year one of them—like a good Snow Canyon team last year—will be out. Also, if last year is precedent, one of the two teams that do make the playoffs will go on the road, regardless of record. Second, all three St. George teams will likely have 3A numbers, but will be competing under this realignment in 4A until 2013. Ironic, is it not, that the BOT voted these teams out of 3A in mid-term for having numbers slightly in excess of the 3A limit (the so called "emergency"), but now with 3A numbers they will be kept in 4A for the next five years. Third, they will be forced to schedule four meaningless regular season games with 3A teams each year, rather than with 4A teams from Region Seven (if the BOT's second realignment proposal had been kept in place). Add to that the fact that Washington County schools (other than Desert Hills) do not have open enrollment and significant numbers of out-of-boundary players (like some of their major competition in 4A), and a reasonable person would have to concede that these schools have a pretty heavy handicap competing for a championship in 4A.
Who wins with this realignment? As it turns out, things are pretty sweet for Hurricane and Cedar. Last year those two teams locked up a playoff spot by beating up on the Region’s perennial weak sister, Canyon View. This year and for the next four, they simply have to beat Canyon View and the untested and undermanned newcomer Desert Hills, which will be playing mostly sophomores and juniors this year. It will be interesting to see if what Hurricane and Cedar won in the boardroom produces a championship on the field.
Created: Tue 08 Jul 2008 - Updated: Tue 12 Aug 2008
Region Nine Mess
By Dave Stott
February 2008
Under pressure from the smaller Region Nine schools, the Utah High School Athletic Association (UHSAA) realigned the Region on an “emergency” basis for the years 2007-2008. The realignment got much of its impetus from Hurricane’s loss to Logan in the 2005 state football semifinals, after which the Hurricane head coach vented his frustration to the media about having to compete against larger schools.
The UHSAA responded by moving the St. George schools (Pine View, Dixie and Snow Canyon) to 4A, but keeping them in Region Nine with the smaller schools. Because UHSAA rules call for realignment only once every four years, many wondered why the UHSAA was unwilling to simply leave Region Nine in status quo until 2008 when the arrival of Desert Hills High School would reduce the numbers at the three larger schools to a level below the current 4A classification threshold of 1200 students. Why indeed did the UHSAA feel justified in creating the Region Nine equivalent of the duck-billed Platypus two years ahead of the normal realignment schedule?
The answer may lie in the UHSAA’s January 24, 2008 draft proposal for the four-year statewide realignment which is to take effect in 2009. That proposal calls for a change in the 4A threshold from 1200 to 1000 students, which would effectively prevent the St. George schools from returning to a 3A classification, because even with the addition of Desert Hills their student populations would exceed 1000.
With the Washington County schools split between 3A and 4A for the foreseeable future, the UHSAA proposal puts the St. George schools in an unworkable three-team 4A region and places Hurricane, Cedar, Canyon View, Desert Hills and Richfield in a five-team 3A region. Such a realignment will have very negative consequences for Washington County schools. First, long standing traditional rivalries will be eliminated, which will lead to a drop in fan interest. Second, the three larger St. George schools will find it impossible to fill a schedule. After playing each other (two games), they will have to fill seven or eight empty schedule slots every year. Filling preseason slots is hard enough, because teams from up north must be willing to travel to St. George (home and home scheduling), but finding available teams once they begin region play is nearly impossible. The inability to schedule games and the necessity of constant out-of-area travel (which the UHSAA said it did not want) will mean a substantial drop in program revenues and will put the schools at a significant competitive disadvantage.
A relatively simple and quite obvious solution is available, however, that would keep Region Nine together and essentially eliminate the negatives. Based on district numbers, just over 5000 students will attend the five area high schools (Dixie, Pine View, Snow Canyon, Desert Hills and Hurricane) in 2008. That fact clearly begs the question, why hasn’t the Washington County School Board equalized the student populations of the five district high schools, thereby qualifying them all for membership in the same region and classification? Why will the new, state-of-the-art Desert Hills High School come on line with a capacity of 1800 students and house 600 to 700 students, while Snow Canyon High School is putting up portable classrooms to house an excess? If special interest groups or specific school board members are preventing this common sense solution from being implemented, don’t we deserve to know who they are?
Furthermore, are school administrators and our legislative representatives planning to protest in masse the change in the classification threshold? Or do they intend to let the UHSAA tear Region Nine apart without a word of objection? If the 4A threshold were simply maintained at 1200 and the student numbers at the five St. George-Hurricane area high schools were split evenly, those schools along with Cedar and Canyon View could continue a long standing alliance in a seven team 3A region and escape the logistical nightmare that will surely follow if the current mess is not cleaned up. Can’t we use some common sense here?
