[charlie22]

Highlands has one of the best public school programs in the country! I can't think of another one that is as small in enrollment that gets so much done as consistently. They definitely have the blue print for winnin. But my only gripe is that they don't play a better schedule. The year they finished real highly ranked in the nation I thought they were overrated. Mostly because the only team they played was Cincy St.X at home. And it wasn't as if St.X was the state champ in Ohio. They flamed out in the playoffs. IMO you have to schedule like the GCL schools to be taken serious nationally. Again not tryin to take anything away from Highlands cause I don't think they've ducked anyone. Their schedule just hasn't been that strong recently. And it may be that they've tried to schedule better and just couldn't. And by strong I mean weighted with outta state teams like Alcoa, MBA, Indy's Warren Central, Colerain, Cardinal Mooney, Trinity, etc. KY football overall is pretty weak.

Thanks for the compliments about Highlands.

As to X flaming out in the Ohio playoffs, I guess it's how you interpret "flaming out". They lost in the playoffs in a very close game to Elder. Elder lost, also in a very close game, to the eventual Ohio big school champion the next week I believe. One could argue that the degree of separation between X and the state champion was pretty narrow. Which is usually the case with the big division Ohio schools. They are all usually exceptionally good and the degree of separation is pretty slim. Also keep in mind that X beat Trinity handily, X of Lou., Colerain and Indy Cathedral last year (and also beat Elder during the regular season). X actually had a very, very good team last year.

As for the schedule, I agree with you. Each year I'd like to see two powerhouse teams on the schedule. More than that is really pushing what one can expect out of a school with 400 boys. And those two powerhouse teams have to be scheduled carefully. Back in 06 we played Elder and Lou. X in back to back weeks. Frankly we were so beat up after playing Elder, it greatly impacted our performance against X (we lost to Elder by 5 I believe and X by 14 after being ahead in both games at half. Actually we were ahead of Elder almost the entire game until the very end). Depth really becomes a huge problem for Highlands when you have to play very good, much bigger schools in back to back weeks. Our back ups are usually sophomores; their back ups are usually seniors (and sometimes juniors) in the case of the GCL schools.

Again, I'd like to see tougher schedules; it's just getting the teams able to play us in the weeks we have available or want to play them. That's easier said than done.

I also agree with you that if Highlands wants to be nationally ranked they need to have wins over GCL teams, X or T, or some of the other schools you mentioned. You may not have noticed, but there is no mention this year by Dale of national championship. And you may be right about them being ranked too high nationally last year. I find those rankings silly to begin with. What I do know is that Highlands had one of the best football teams from A to Z last year that I've every seen in my many, many years of watching football and that was true even after they lost their starting QB. Think how much better they'd have been towards the end of the season and in the playoffs had he been the starting QB in those games. Yowzer.