Fox wants national title game


During June, stories published in The Washington Post and The (Norfolk) Virginian-Pilot reported that Fox Sports Net contacted over 100 high schools nationwide about staging a national title game starting in late December of the year 2000.

(Press release found here, copied locally here.)

Fox Sports News Primetime plans to debut a weekly "Fox Fab Fifty" poll this fall. They were also toying with the idea of paying $5,000 to each school in the final poll, and $50,000 to the two schools that play in the title game.

However, the National Federation of State High School Associations has a bylaw that prohibits any kind of contest to determine a single national champion for any team or individual in a sport. The bylaws are not binding (evident by the fact that they are conducting 35 NATIONAL HIGH SCHOOL CHAMPIONSHIPS ® themselves), but most of them are adhered to by the state associations.

Therefore, Fox went directly to 106 schools - private and public - first, in order to get the support of the coaches, who could then pitch it to their individual states. According to Fox's co-hort, Student Sports, Inc., only two of the schools indicated they would not sign (or had not already signed) the non-binding letters-of-intent to participate in the game. Among those who reportedly had already signed were Hampton and DeMatha, a private school in Hyattsville, Md.
(Hampton coach Mike Smith likes the idea of a title game, and said he hopes that his school wouldn't be denied the opportunity to participate if invited.)

However, many of the states already have rules against this.
Maryland Public Secondary Schools Athletic Association executive director Ned Sparks said that Maryland has rules against national championship games. Virginia High School League executive director Ken Tilley said that it isn't permitted. Also coming out against the game were the D.C. Interscholastic Athletic Association, the Ohio High School Athletic Association, and the Florida High School Activities Association. Officials in Ohio & Texas don't expect their states to back the concept, either, although Six schools from football-frenzied Texas signed the agreement.


Look for more on this after the NFHS convention in July.


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