By Dana Hess
For the S.D. Newspaper Association.
PIERRE — The South Dakota High School Activities Association board of directors tried to side-step a scheduling nightmare Wednesday while allowing a football cooperative to switch from 11-man football to nine-man.
Dakota Hills Football Cooperative, consisting of the schools of Waubay, Summit and Wilmot, requested the change. Part of the cooperative’s proposal was that it would be ineligible for the 2023-2024 playoffs.
After participating in 11-man football last season, Summit Superintendent Mike Schmidt told the board that to save the cooperative’s football program it would need to switch to nine-man football.
“We have a lot of parents who are concerned,” Schmidt said, noting that the cooperative fielded a team of mostly underclassmen with just one senior and three juniors. With mostly younger players, the co-op found itself, in one contest, down 70-0 at halftime.
“We’re playing a junior varsity team against Aberdeen Roncalli or Deuel,” Schmidt said. “I’m going to tell you, we will have a program if it’s nine-man.”
Football schedules are set up in a two-year cycle. Schmidt said he knew a change at this point would be a logistical problem for the association.
“We’d have to do every schedule over,” said SDHSAA Assistant Executive Director Randy Soma of the 11B and nine-man schedules. “It affects everybody.”
The board unanimously allowed Dakota Hills to drop down to nine-man, but without changing the schedule. It will be up to the cooperative, with the help of the association, to find open dates when they can play other nine-man teams. The association will also help the cooperative’s scheduled 11-man opponents find teams to fill out their schedules.
