Sold Out

December 13, 2016

We are sometimes criticized for limiting the scope of school sports – for restricting long-distance travel and prohibiting national tournaments; but there is no question that we are doing the correct thing by protecting school sports from the excesses and abuses that characterize major college sports.

Across the spectrum of intercollegiate athletics, but especially in Division I football and basketball, there exists an insatiable “keep-up-with-the-Joneses” appetite.

Universities are building increasingly extravagant facilities. They are sending their “students” into increasingly expansive scheduling. But it’s never enough.

There is always another university somewhere building a bigger stadium, a fancier press box or more palatial dressing rooms, practice facilities and coaches quarters.

So-called “students” are sent across the US and beyond to play on any day at any time in order to generate revenue to keep feeding the beast.

The Big Ten knows it’s wrong, admits it, but schedules football games on Friday nights to attract larger rights fees from television.

Feeling used or abused, some of the athletes of Northwestern and then at the University of Wisconsin, talk of creating a union to protect themselves from the obvious, rampant exploitation.

And then occasionally, some college coaches dare to suggest that high schools are wrong to have regulations that reject the road that colleges have traveled, a road that has distanced athletics very far from academics in intercollegiate sports.

The intercollegiate model is not and must not be the interscholastic model. We who are sold out for educational athletics have nothing good to learn from those who have sold out for broadcast revenue.

STATE CHAMPS! Michigan: Extra Point Week 7

October 6, 2022

This week on STATE CHAMPS! Extra Point: Lorne Plant, Sydney Cariel and Devin Gardner recap the notable games from Week 6 and preview the marquee games going into Week 7.

1:46 - Davison vs. Walled Lake Western Recap
3:21 - Dexter vs. Ann Arbor Huron Recap
5:30 - South Christian vs. Grand Rapids Catholic Central Recap
9:05 - Devin on the Rankings
10:37 - Livonia Franklin #17 in Rankings, Who to watch: Forest Hills Central
13:14 - De La Salle #3 in Rankings, Macomb Dakota #6 in Rankings
16:56 - Mr. Football Award
20:47 - DMC Gamechangers
22:05 - Anvil Award 
25:51 - Week 7 Preview
28:28 - Romeo vs. Chippewa Valley - Game of the Week Preview