OHSAA to vote on expansion proposal for basketball, other sports Thursday. What we know

Ohio high school soccer, girls volleyball, basketball, softball and baseball divisions may be expanding if the Ohio High School Athletic Association board of directors votes favorably to executive director Doug Ute's proposal Thursday.

OHSAA officials recently had six regional meetings with member schools to discuss the topic, including one in Columbus on Jan. 29.

“This proposal finally addresses the enrollment disparity in Division I and Division II, where the largest schools are sometimes three times larger than the smaller schools in the same division,” Ute said. “We anticipate expanding the number of divisions will be a revenue-neutral change, so this is not driven by money. We will certainly need to restructure the tournaments and add host sites, etc., which will take time and work by our staff, district athletic boards and member schools."

What's in this proposal?

According to a release, the proposal calls for the following scale to be used to guide the board’s decision on the number of divisions for girls volleyball, football, soccer, basketball, softball and baseball. The sports of lacrosse, field hockey, ice hockey and boys volleyball would not change from their current division numbers.

Tim Stried, OHSAA media relations director, said a similar chart has been used for football but the other sports hadn't held fast to any chart, until this proposal.

• 199 or fewer teams in a sport equal one division
• 200 to 299 teams: two divisions
• 300 to 399 teams: three divisions
• 400 to 499 teams: four divisions
• 500 to 599 teams: five divisions
• 600 to 699 teams: six divisions
• 700 and more teams: seven divisions

For girls volleyball, soccer, basketball, softball and baseball, the largest 64 schools would be placed into Division I. The next largest 64 schools would be placed into Division II. The remaining schools would be divided as evenly as possible into the remaining divisions. The OHSAA already does something similar to this in football, in which the largest 10% of schools are placed into Division I and the remaining schools are divided evenly in Divisions II-VII.

If this proposal moves forward, boys and girls soccer will end up with five divisions, softball with six or seven and boys and girls basketball, girls volleyball and baseball with seven, Stried said.

The proposal does not call for a change to the formula the OHSAA uses for individual sports to determine the number of athletes required for team designation, which includes five in bowling, five in cross country, four in golf, three in gymnastics, seven in swimming and diving, four in tennis, nine in track and field and seven in wrestling.

However, the proposal does call for the following divisional chart to be used for individual sports, defined as the type of sport where individuals can advance in the postseason regardless of how their team does.

• 200 or fewer teams: one division
• 201 to 450 teams: two divisions
• 451 to 700 teams: three divisions
• 701 and more teams: four divisions

The proposal does not include any expansion to the football postseason, which is already at seven divisions. In addition, OHSAA member schools must vote on any changes to the current deployment of the competitive balance process during the annual referendum voting process.

Why was this proposal necessary?

In short, member feedback over the past year has leaned toward supporting expansion to narrow the gap between the enrollment of the largest and smallest Division I schools.

Ohio is the fourth-largest state in the United States in terms of the number of schools, but in many cases, the number of divisions doesn’t reflect that size compared to smaller states, the release states.

“Any time you can give more kids the opportunity to have a postseason tournament run and get their communities engaged and excited, that’s a good thing," Ute said, "and we don’t believe that having more state champions waters down the significance of winning a championship."

Why isn't track and field in this proposal?

The Cincinnati Enquirer reported the efforts of coach Jim Vanatsky, who was a longtime track coach at Loveland and had a stop at Moeller, to address the same kind of disparity in track and field.

Vanatsky's issue was that the schools with higher enrollment numbers, public and non-public, consistently advanced to the state tournament and won championships. From 2015-18, every Division I state champion in boys and girls basketball and baseball came from a school that was in the top 10% of the state in enrollment.

Stried said there have been several meetings about expanded divisions for track, which has more participation and a stronger argument for expansion. The current debate centers on what number of individual-sport athletes constitute a team. Speaking hypothetically, Stried said if a school has eight runners on the team and, say, nine are considered a "team," then that school wouldn't count as a team in the formula.

However, Stried said this debate is not finished as track and field expansion is still on the table.

What's next?

The board could choose to approve all, none or parts of the proposal at the 8 a.m. meeting Thursday. They could also defer parts of the proposal to a future meeting.

If the board approves the plan, the OHSAA will announce structural and date changes for future state tournaments at a later date to possibly begin this fall.

Cincinnati Enquirer reporter Brendan Connelly contributed to this report.