who thinks grand state should be brought back? it would be great for clearing up all the talk about teh best wrestler in different classes. for instance, last year 215 wouldve been great to have grand State. PS. why did they do away with grand state?

If there is no logical answer to a question then the answer is always money. kind of like why is there no playoff system in division I college football? answer, money.

It ain't about money - maybe a little - the fact is that the small schools were kicking butt over the power moguls in the 6-5 A schools
How many Topeka Schools did well at Grand State??
Ask yourself this Why did KSHAA (The big dawgs at Topeka) Decided it was not good for High School
Athletics??
Answer - Politics=Assholes

I think that Dalefish failed to do his homework before opening his mouth. I dont think that 6A even exist back when they had Grand State Tourney's. Example, Emporia was a 4A school back then.

The results from Grand State Wrestling were pretty well distributed between the classes that existed back then.

The problem was that Grand State for other sports like Basketball, Football, etc, were totally dominated by the larger schools so the Grand State concept was abandoned for all sports.

Aw, c'mon Marco...

If it weren't for uninformed opinion, this forum wouldn't be any fun at all.

OK, tkdwn42

Your right, I'll try to lossen up a bit.

Here's to the "Big Dawgs" in Topeka. Bring Back Grand State For Wrestling Only.

Thanks

I think I was 5 or 6 years old when Dad took me to the second Grand State wrestling tournament, so I am certainly not well acquainted with all of the facts. But this is what I had always heard.

Grand State was a great fit for high school wrestling because it was an individual sport and did not matter whether you were the smallest or the largest school in Kansas, the best you could do was to have have one individual per team per weight. If an individual were good enough to place in his respective state division, he got the invite to Grand State. So it was an event geared toward individual success. If your team was lucky enough to have enough talent that year, you could then begin watching the scoreboard for team success.

Basketball on the other hand was a little more difficult. It is purely a team concept. The larger schools seemed to have an advantage because they had the larger population base to field a team from. And while a smaller school might be able to field a competitive starting line-up, in most cases they had difficulty in dealing with the depth of talent on a larger school's roster.

Because of this the Grand State B-ball tournament was at risk of failing and for that reason the KSHSAA chose to do away with the wrestling side too in order to keep equality between the two winter sports.

Maybe its the wrestler's mentality that I was instilled with, but I don't agree with the logic. Kind of a "if you can't beat'em, quit philosophy" on the b-ball side. Where the wrestling side appeared to relish the opportunity to compete against the best of the best. But that opens up a whole new debate.

Dalefish's arguement about western KS schools kicking tail has also been voiced frequently in our area, but may not carry a lot of water - given that Kapaun won Grand State both years of its existence.

I have never seen the actual completed brackets from the events, so I don't know how the distribution of medals or team trophies broke down. But would guess that a portion of Kapaun's success did come from their ability to recruit athletes to their program, but that is just speculation.

Again, I was not old enough to understand or care when this was going on, but I thought I would pass along what I had heard. Feel free to set me straight, if need be.

And if anyone in Topeka is listening - we'd love to see Grand State wrestling reinstated!

I see no point in having a poll over this subject in the first place. Everyone who has been around the wrestling communityu for the last 10 or so years knows that many proposals have been brought in front of KSHSAA about these very issues and the aswer has always been "No" and it will probably always be that way from no on. KSHSAA has no interest in figuring out who is the best in the state in fact they could care less they are only there as a governing body. This issue died a long time ago so stop begging its not going to happen

To: Marco from Dalefish (the guy what don't do his homework} Emporia maybe have been a 4A in 1975-6 but my point is that a smaller class beat the big-uns - (If Les Brown and the KSHAA association is correct a 3A school (Kapaun)NOT Emporia NOT Topeka won both grand state championships)

I would like to see a tourney with Hoxie, Goodland, Colby, Norton, Scott City, Sainty, Atwood,Oberlin, and all of your Eastern big dawg wannabees

To: Les Brown I think you are right about Kapaun and the possibility to have an "ability to recruit athletes"

To: both Marco (AKA Neandrethal Man) and to Les Brown(knows whats sup):

I personally would like to see Grand State come back

To: everyone especially the shakers and movers in Topeka Question: Haw much money did the Grand State Wresling Tournament Make/lose?

To: Cooker - after consideration/reflection over a couple of days - Answer may = money

Question: Why does Topeka toss 123A all together for Wrestling but not other sports??

i see no reason why grand state shouldnt be brought back. why can't they do dual and grand state both.if grand state was such a big success, why do away with it? pretty stupid stuff.

JUST FOR INFO, THE LITTLE SCHOOLS DID AND STILL COULD COMPETE AT GRAND STATE SINCE OBERLIN PLACED 2ND IN '75 AND TIED WITH GOODLAND FOR 2ND IN '76.
KAPAUN WAS 3A BACK THEN ALSO.

It may sound insane, but why cant we as in the wrestling comminutity find a way to after the high school state, work with usa-ks kids in putting on a grand state, have the kids all get wrestling cards if they want and place in the top four at their division and have a tourney just for that.

GRAND STATE, 1975 AND 1976.

Once again as I explained earlier no matter how much you try and do KSHSAA will not allow it. I spoke with Rick Bowden earlier this year and he offered some good insight into the issue. It is basically that if wrestling has a grand state event then every other sport is going to want one and that wiould created massive scheduling conflicts and many problems and that issue alone if worth the answer of no, but also money issues come into play. So as I said before its better that everyone drops this subject becuase its not going to happen, please!

TO SAY THAT THE REASON THAT GRAND STATE WAS
CANCELLED, IS BECAUSE THE SMALL SCHOOLS WERE
BEATING BIG SCHOOLS IS STUPID. ANYBODY THAT
KNOWS ANYTHING ABOUT WRESTLING WOULD KNOW THAT
IT DOESN'T MATTER WHAT SIZE YOUR SCHOOL IS.
A GOOD WRESTLING TEAM IS A GOOD WRESTLING TEAM.
LOOK AT THE POLLS HOXIE IS IN EVERYONES TOP 5.
I DON'T KNOW WHY IT WAS CANCELLED BUT IT'S
PROBABLY GOT MORE TO DO WITH TIME AND MONEY.
ABOUT THE KAPUAN RECRUITNG ISSUE, THEY CAN STILL
RECRUIT AND GIVE "SCHOLARSHIPS", WHY AREN'T THEY STILL A TOP SCHOOL IN ALL SPORTS?THAT IS JUST THE
EXCUSE THAT THE SECOND PLACE TEAM USES!!! I DON'T
BUY IT!!!THE STATE IS FULL OF PRIVATE SCHOOLS, AND
THE ONLY ONE THAT IS DOMINANT IN SPORTS IS COLGAN
IN PITTSBURG!!! :rolleyes:

hey dalefish did you say "(the guy what don't do his homework. i think you did then you came back and did disproved what was said by the others. come on man wrestling homework is cool but english homework never killed anyone.

just as a side note emporia was a wrestling powerhouse back in the day, i dont know if they were the grand champs but a little side note: my coach wrestled there and won grandstate his senior year. i think that is a great accomplishment. i personally feel that, though it may not happen, grandstate should be reinstated.

This is Neandrethal Man (AKA Marco)

Nigel knows what he's talking about. As I remember about a year ago he spent a considerable amount of time talking to KSHAA people about this issue and met a brick wall.

The honest truth to the whole issue is that KSHAA is not going to sponser an event for one sport that they can not sponser for all sports.

Grand State is a great fit for wrestling because obviously school size does not matter, everyone knows that. However that is not the case for the marque sports (Basketball, Football, Soccer, etc)

If it makes Blowfish, I mean Dalefish sleep better at night thinking that KSHAA did away with Grand State because the little school were killin the big ones then thats fine with me.

By the way Dalefish thanks for the tag.

Yours Truly

Neandrethal Man

Nigel, i will stop with the grand state business. i just wanted to know how everyone felt about it. thanks everyone for your posts.

Hate to bring this topic back from the dead, but....

I agree with Nigel in that there will be no KSHSAA sponsored grand state. But disagree with him about the fact there could not be one. JRob is on the right track, if we are truly interested in hosting one.

Kansas Kids, KWCA or a corporate sponsor could all take on the roll, if it were sucessfully proven that enough interest were present to make the event economically feasible.

The real issue would be scheduling. You would want to make sure everyone is still in good mat shape, so it would need to be pretty quickly after the high school season. But you have kid's state, NHSCA senior nationals, the KWCA East/West dual.....

I guess my point is this - if we really want to see the event revived, we need to stop barking at the KSHSAA and start looking for alternative sponsors/hosts.

It would be a great event for the athletes, the fans and collegiate recruiters. I would sure like to see it back and certaily wish it were in place when I finished up high school.

AND JD, you quoted me out of context. I did not use Kapaun's ability to recruit as an excuse. Just offered it as a possible reason for why one eastern Kansas team fared so well, when others from that portion of the state were behind the western kansas teams at that time. And don't kid yourself, Kapaun certainly used recruting tactics to their advantage during their hay-days in the mid 70's.

to cooker, the reason they don't have a D1 playoff system is because it wouldn't work, not money, they've got tons of money up there so that is not an issue