News

IHSAA Commissioner Bobby Cox and State Senator Mike Delph, R-Carmel, today announced a series of town meetings which will allow Hoosier citizens an opportunity to voice their opinions on the topic of the old single class basketball tournament and the current multiple class format.

The Commissioner and Senator will travel to 11 different high schools around the state over the next several weeks to interact with fellow citizens beginning Tuesday, April 10, at Fort Wayne Northrop High School.

Individuals will be allowed two minutes each to voice their opinions, and a straw poll will be taken at each meeting. Member school principals, athletic directors as well as boys and girls basketball coaches at those schools will be able to share their views electronically with the IHSAA.

"While the IHSAA is a private, non-for-profit membership organization with elected representation, I feel it is important for our organization to listen to the opinions of the general public in an effort to clearly communicate those sentiments to our member schools,” said Cox. “The principals within our 408 member schools rely on the Association for current and relevant data to equip them to make informed decisions regarding education-based athletics within our state.  I look forward to travelling the state with Senator Delph and visiting with Hoosiers during the next two months.”

The IHSAA is governed by its legislative body, the Board of Directors. Composed of 19 members who are elected by member school principals from three IHSAA legislative districts, the directors serve staggered three-year terms. The Board of Directors meets annually with the responsibility of establishing the Association’s rules and regulations.

On April 29, 1996, the IHSAA Board of Directors approved by a 12-5 vote a proposal from the Class Sports Study Committee which recommended multiple class tournament formats in the sports of boys basketball, girls basketball, boys soccer, girls soccer, baseball, softball and volleyball with a maximum of four classes. Implementation of the new formats began with the 1997-98 school year with the exception of soccer.

The vote prompted the first referendum of school principals in IHSAA history in September, 1996 and the membership upheld the action by a 220-157 count.

On May 3, 1999, as mandated by the original vote in 1996 that implemented the multiple-class format, the Board reviewed the initiative and rejected by a vote of 13-5 a motion to return to a single-class tournament in those sports. The Board had the option of retaining a multiple-class format, returning to a single-class format or approving a hybrid of the two formats.

In November 2005, Commissioner Blake Ress conducted a survey of the IHSAA membership in response to a non-binding Indiana House resolution asking the IHSAA to stage a single class basketball tournament. Results presented at the January 2006 meeting of the IHSAA Executive Committee show that 341 of the 400 member schools responded to the survey with just 10.6% (36 yes, 305 no) favoring the addition of a single-class basketball tournament.

About the Indiana High School Athletic Association, Inc. (IHSAA)
Founded in 1903, the purpose of the Indiana High School Athletic Association, Inc. (IHSAA) is to encourage, regulate and give direction to wholesome amateur interschool athletic competition between its 408 member schools. The Association provides state championship tournament series in 20 sports, 10 for girls and 10 for boys. Approximately 160,000 student athletes participate in IHSAA sports on an annual basis.