Certainly it works other places, and in both directions...State Champ 97 wrote:Funny that doesn't work in other places. Enrollment is enrollment regardless how many hockey players you have.
If everything is based on enrollment, why do Roseau (371), Benilde-St Margrets (897), Holy Angels (691) and Hill Murray (599) play AA? Why did people scream bloody murder about Saint Thomas Academy playing in the Class A bracket for so long? Didn't have a thing to do with enrollment...it had to do with the relative strength of the program.
If the point of having a two-tier system is competitive balance, it only makes sense to have movement bi-directional, with enrollment as a baseline factor, but not the only factor. On paper, Central HS alone (1621) would be AA. One of their players could play all three forward positions, and the other both D plus tend goal. I'm sure they'd do fine. As it is, only 3 of the 5 schools technically part of the coop actually contribute players. Why do you think 5 large high schools need to coop to field a team in the first place?
Programs petition the HSL to play a class above where their on paper enrollment puts them because they are competitive at that level. Why should a program not be able to move down for the same reason? Enrollment only tells a very small part of the story, whichever direction you're riding on the escalator.