MSHSNCA State Meet Proposals Update
The Advisory Committee of the MSHSNCA submitted three proposals for change to the MSHSL in 2006; two of which passed. They are:1) SCORING ALL TEAMS
The team score shall be determined by totaling the points scored by the top four finishers in the event. Teams with fewer than four finishers shall be included in the team point totals. In the past teams with fewer than four finishers in an event were disregarded in the team point totals. These teams were listed as incomplete when results were reported to the media. At the state meet non-team qualifiers will ski only as individuals and will not be included in the team scoring, regardless of how many individuals from a team qualify (this hasn't changed).
2) STATE MEET FORMAT OF PURSUIT ONLY
The team score shall be determined by totaling the points scored by the top four finishers in the pursuit event (rather than in the classical event and the freestyle event). A section team shall be 7 skiers. The top 8 pursuit finishers after the Section team will qualify for the state meet. 15 boys and 15 girls will qualify from each section. There will be no classic only or freestyle only qualifiers. Medals will be awarded to the top 10 pursuit finishers at the section and state meets. All-State Awards will be awarded to the top 25 finishers in the State Meet.
3) INCREASE TEAMS FOR STATE MEET
A proposal to allow 2 teams from each section to qualify for the state meet failed. The MSHSL requires 128 schools competing to consider this. We currently have 92 boy's teams and 94 girl's teams.
Two additional proposals are currently being evaluated:
1) MULTI-EVENT STATE MEET
A multi-event state meet format proposal was presented by Rollie Ring-Jarvi of Elk River. His proposal is to change the state meet into three separate races - sprints, relay and continuous pursuit. Scoring for the team champion could be weighted fairly for these three events. There would be three separate individual champions - sprint, team relay, and individual pursuit. His conference will be holding this event in January to evaluate the feasibility of such a format. He will report back to the coaches at the spring meeting in April.
2) TWO-CLASS STATE MEET
The two-class proposal by Joe Teff was presented and discussed. The proposal is simply to change nordic skiing from one class to two classes. All details concerning this change are pure speculation because the MSHSL will make all decisions regarding the how, why and when. We do know that the split would most likely be made at 64/32, by enrollment with approximately 900 students being the cut-off. On-line voting took place during the week of Nov. 13-17. Each head coach of each team received one vote. You must be a member of the association to vote.
If approved by the Coaches Association, these proposals would be forwarded to MSHSL for final approval or rejection.