Coach Talks About Wayzata Football's Jump to New Class

Wayzata High School's football team will be competing in a new class beginning in 2012.

On April 7, the Minnesota State High School League (MSHSL) Board of Directors voted to add Class 6A in football for the 2012 season, a move directly impacting Wayzata. The state currently awards football championships in nine-man and Class 1A through 5A. 

The vote came on the heels of a recommendation by the MSHSL Football Task Force. The plan is for the new class to include the 32 schools with the state’s largest enrollments, split into four eight-team sections. Some schools may opt up or down in class, so it is uncertain exactly which schools will make up the class. 

The Trojans, however, will undoubtedly be a member of the new class. According to 2011-12 enrollment numbers on the MSHSL website, Wayzata has an enrollment of 3,060 students, the highest in the state.

Head football coach Brad Anderson doesn’t foresee the change affecting his team on the field, but he does have some misgivings about the new plan.

“One of my concerns about adding a new class is having teams say we’re a class up, and they don’t want to play us,” he said. “The biggest thing [for us] will be how they do the playoff structure. To me it seems a little more logical to have eight four-team sections.”

Wayzata is the defending state champion in Class 5A, which houses schools with the state’s largest enrollments. Class 5A has a largest school to smallest school enrollment ratio of about 2.5:1. Class 6A would reduce that ratio to about 1.8:1.

Yet coach Anderson and activities director Jaime Sherwood are more worried about a measure not passed by the MSHSL: implementation of section football scheduling. Had the board put that in place, it would have meant that a team’s eight-game regular season schedule would have been filled mostly with teams in its playoff section.

That would have a big impact on Wayzata and its fellow Lake Conference members.

Unlike most conferences in the state, the Lake only has five members, meaning its teams have had to scramble to fill their schedules. Last season, the Trojans couldn’t find enough opponents and played just six regular season games.

The Trojans have an agreement to play Carmel Catholic (IL) in 2011, pending approval from both states’ high school leagues. The game would take place in Dubuque, IA to limit travel for each team.

Sherwood, a former MSHSL board president, made a presentation at the April 7 meeting pushing for section football scheduling. He said that during his tenure as board president, he encouraged members to look toward the future when considering the impact of their decisions.

“You don’t have a lot of support for it now, but five years down the road, people say, ‘boy that’s a good idea,’” he said of how he hoped people would view section football scheduling.

“At this point, I’m disappointed that the state high school league hasn’t acted on our concerns,” Anderson added.