That is our conclusion as well. Focus on grades in high school. Performance in travel ball. Play h.s. for the experience of doing it if it's a good fit.
High school softball
- Thread starter Sweetclemens
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A few years ago, my daughter was on an unofficial visit to a D2 school not too far from home (pre-covid)and the coach said to the effect.
"I don't want to drive to Atlanta and maybe see you pitch 1-2 innings, I want to come see what you do against XXXXXX". Team their rival
Stuck out as sometime opportunities may be at the expense of what the budget or philosophy of interested coaches is. Majority of kids play 3.5 hours away from home for a reason.
South Dakota plays in the fall as well, and FINALLY just had softball become sanctioned. They are voting in a few weeks whether to leave it in the fall or move it to the spring. Most of the big high schools want to stay fall due to the weather, and most of the small schools want the spring due to not having enough girls in their school to fill all the fall sports.
Yes not technically August but playoffs end July 23 unless I'm reading this wrong so I was off one week.
Season Information - Iowa High School Girls Athletic Union
Iowa girls high school softball season information.
ighsau.org
- Aug 21, 2008
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I still would love to know how this is legal. I am sure people much smarter than me have challenged this in court but, how a school can dictate what a kid does off school property and not on school hours is astounding. I know, I know... everyone knows that going in to playing for HS and rules are rules. I just don't understand how that's a rule or how it's legal. Or WHY it's a rule in the first place.
- Aug 21, 2008
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Admittedly, my experience with Iowa softball is primarily with Iowa Premier (IPF) and the majority of their pitchers do not play HS ball, I don't know about position players. However, knowing the organization and director, I would find it hard to believe too many IPF kids play HS instead of the TB schedule. So, if the school games run through July, I will stand corrected. For some reason I thought it was done earlier. But perhaps the kid who told me that was just eliminated early??? I don't know. @El Oso you could be right.Yes not technically August but playoffs end July 23 unless I'm reading this wrong so I was off one week.
Season Information - Iowa High School Girls Athletic Union
Iowa girls high school softball season information.
I am not sure how or why Iowa plays their HS softball at this time. I was told once it had to do with farming and crops being planted/harvested. But I don't know if that's true. I do know that Iowa is missing out on some very good softball players by having their HS season at this time. I don't mean to suggest the IPF is the only game in town for top players but, I can tell you HS stands no chance of getting their top pitchers as long as the times overlap and conflict. I would think other players in Iowa have the same dilemma. So even with the best coach in the world at a HS in Iowa, I think they will miss out on many of their potential top players just because of the time of year they play and the rules restricting a player from doing both TB and HS.
- Jun 20, 2015
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Ohio does similiar. once school team has a scrimmage or game, players cannot practice, scrimmage or play games with Non-scholastic teams. And most high school coaches overstep and forbid contact even earlier than the actual rule is. Penalty if caught is forfeiture of all games said player played in (at least that's what i understood penalty to be). Similiar to rules for max 4 players from same high school team being on same travel ball team roster.
The youth sports world revolves primarily around football and basketball, not softball. The HS rules were established primarily for football and boys basketball. There was justifiable concern for kids playing being injured when playing too much football or too much basketball. Some states use the same rules for all sports. Others don't (like California).
The legality is pretty straight forward. Schools belong to an umbrella organization for sports. In Illinois, it is the IHSA. For California, it is the CIF. Etc, The umbrella organization sets the participation rules for member schools. The rules are set up to be fair for all schools in the state.
More generally--you are correct that the schools cannot dictate what the kids do away from school. But, they can control the participation rules for school sponsored activities. E.g., minimum grade point average, regular attendance, etc.
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- Aug 21, 2008
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No disputing what you said. I just think in today's society where everything is a lawsuit, this would be brought up over and over as being unfair. Why this rule is in place makes no sense but, the fact that it's there goes to the heart of the animosity felt between HS and TB programs. People often ask why they don't work together and it's pretty clear why they don't. I do wish they'd stop blaming each other and get the rule changed. It'd be interesting to see how many more players will play in HS if they're allowed to do both. I believe the level of play would go up significantly.
Because forcing kids to split time between two teams simultaneously is unfair to the kid, and it's detrimental to the high school teams. And since the IHSA cares about high school teams, it makes sense.
As for legality: How could it not be legal? They're not saying you can't play travel ball. They're saying you can't play for a high school team if you're playing travel ball. The association that governs high school sports getting to decide who's eligible to play those sports doesn't seem strange to me.
Should professionals (quite a few sports, like tennis, have pros who are HS age) be allowed to also compete in HS competition? State associations govern that, too.
