High school basketball fans debate fate of state tournament

Loogootee is a dot of a town in southern Indiana. But on a Tuesday night in late February, it was a ghost town.

The parking lot of Loogootee High School, however, was packed to the brim. Cars parked on the grass far from the entrance.

The main attraction was a decades-old rivalry between the Loogootee High School Lions and the Jasper High School Wildcats from down U.S. Highway 231.

Jasper boys’ basketball plays in the Indiana High School Athletics Association’s Class 3A conference, the second-largest, while Loogootee plays Class A, the smallest.

A game like this, between a tiny school with only a couple hundred students, and a large-class school with more than a thousand students, is rare these days to say the least. Ever since the IHSAA transferred from a single tournament — in which every school had a shot at the state title game — to a class system, games between big schools and small schools are increasingly rare.

Only in the past five years have the Wildcats and Lions reignited the annual contest.

“It’s a rare occurrence, but it’s the chance that you have to knock off a Goliath that made it interesting,” Loogootee Coach Mike Wagoner said. “Here at Loogootee, we are used to beating the bigger schools.”

Inside the high school is Jack Butcher Arena, home of the Loogootee High School Lions boys’ basketball team. It has a capacity of 4,571 roaring Lions fans for a town with a population of 2,751 — and that’s without the fold-out bleachers brought out for big games.

Just outside the arena, a glass case with net-draped championship trophies dating back to the 1940s, memorabilia from the 1975 state championship run, newspaper clippings and team portraits sit pristine under the careful watch of generations of fans.

They are vestiges of the past, heralds of memory.

As the band played the Loogootee High School fight song to the tune of “Washington and Lee Swing,” an announcer came on the crackling loudspeaker to read the starting lineup.

“For the Loogootee Lions, starting at No. 10, Luke Jones,” the announcer said.

Nothing else could be heard as a 100 Lion fans leapt to their feet in the yellow arena, roaring and cheering on their boys in the white home-team jerseys they’ve worn for
decades.

THE MILAN MISREPRESENTATION
In Indiana, people often associate class basketball with the Milan Miracle: the 1954 Milan High School basketball team that fought its way to a state championship.

It’s the story director David Anspaugh capitalized upon in his 1986 film “Hoosiers,” starring Gene Hackman and Dennis Hopper.

Milan’s story is a great one: the scrawny little farm boys going against the big city ballplayers. It’s David versus Goliath to the core. It feeds our urge to cheer for the little guy.

The problem is, of course, Milan never appeared in another state final game since. No Indiana team of the same size saw the same success of the 1954 Milan Indians since the first state tournament in 1911.

“Larger schools hold inherent unfair advantages because they have a larger pool of students to pull from,” IHSAA Commissioner Bobby Cox said in a recent interview.

In the early 1990s, Cox said IHSAA started a commission to investigate dividing teams into classes. That proposal was forwarded to the IHSAA, and the association’s executive committee voted 12-5 to split into classes.

A referendum vote from all member schools can be called if petitioned by members to overturn an association decision, according to IHSAA bylaws. In September 1996, schools petitioned for the only such vote in IHSAA history on the subject of class athletics.

Members upheld the decision to split into four classes with a 220-157 vote. The 1997-98 season was the first played with four state champions.

The debate was started up again when in January, State Sen. Mike Delph, R-Carmel, introduced legislation that would ban athletics organizations like the IHSAA if they operated under class basketball. Before the legislation even made it out of committee, Cox called Delph and struck a deal.

The two would go on a tour of schools in April and May to have open town hall meetings to discuss the issue and conduct a straw poll of those attending.

“This issue comes up every five years,” Cox said. “It’s always a basketball issue, no one asks about a single-class softball tournament or a single-class baseball tournament. The tournament changed. The decision to go to class was made by educators.”

IN THE LIONS’ DEN
At the game in Loogootee, the Wildcat boys were no bigger, no faster and no more talented than the Lions. For most of the game, the two teams were within spitting distance of one another.

With a little less than two minutes left, the Lions earned their largest lead of the game, 57-45.

As time ran out, the 66-59 score on the board revealed Loogootee as the victor. After the game, Wagoner congratulated his team on a game well- played.

“This was a good game, a good win. Tomorrow will be a light practice. Shoots, free throws, and we’ll see who starts on Thursday, OK?” he said. “Alright, hands in. One, two, three, team.”

The locker room was tiny, with room for 20 players. The team’s three seniors, fresh off the win, stood around talking about class basketball and the prospect of returning to a single tournament.

“I’d like that,” senior Austin Bradley said. “It’d show who’s the best team in Indiana again. Rather than not play, like, just small schools, we’d see who really is the best.”

“Really? I don’t think so. I mean, you’ve got that one Milan team and our two teams,” senior Bryant Ackerman said. “They should’ve gone back a while ago, but now I don’t think so.”

They went back and forth, without a consensus. Why should they expect to succeed when they have to go against big teams? Possibly a two-class system would be best.

All the conversation is speculation. These players have never competed in a
one-tournament conference.

Wagoner said that’s really the shame of converting to class ball. He played for Butcher in the mid-1970s and was a reserve guard when the Lions made their 1975 state title run.

“The current players will never know the excitement that the one class system had,” Wagoner said. “Although the current class system is just as exciting around here anyway, that’s all they know.”

For the seniors, it came down to the realization that if the single tournament was still in place, they would have very little chance of ever raising a state championship banner at Jack Butcher Arena.

“I like class,” senior Aaron Howell said. “It lets us know we can win state. I don’t think we could beat a North Central or a Ben Davis. Maybe back in the day, but not now. No matter what the old folks here say.”

“THE WORST DECISION IN THE HISTORY OF THE STATE OF INDIANA”
On Monday evening, Delph and Cox met at the Seymour High School auditorium for one of 11 town hall meetings across the state to survey public opinion on the multi-class system.

There were about 40 people, mostly older men, in the large auditorium. In attendance were a few coaches, many fans, but no players.

On their way in, community members were handed a pamphlet about the IHSAA and a small ballot. The options: “I am in favor of a single class basketball tournament,” and “I prefer the current multiple class tournament format.”

“Part of our goal here is to give our area principals information on what the public is thinking,” Cox said in a brief introduction.

After explaining the format of the evening, Cox gave the podium over to Delph, who explained the bill he had introduced and his opposition to the multi-class system.

“I think basketball is unlike any other sport in Indiana,” Delph said. “In part, the Indiana high school basketball tradition, in my humble opinion, has made legends.”

Leigh Evans, of Greenwood, Ind., was the first to take the microphone. He's the creator of HickoryHusker.com, a website dedicated to Indiana high school sports.

He suggested a system with sectionals divided into classes and a combined semi-state and state finals tournament.

“I think IHSAA has a unique opportunity to, number one, reunite the state and, number two, create something that is unique to Indiana,” Owens said.

Others took the microphone and spoke their piece. Some had played ball as early as 1936. Others were current coaches from across Southern Indiana. Most were in favor of a single tournament, some more passionate than others.

“I don’t wanna be rude, but I think the decision to go to the multi-class tournament was the worst decision in the history of the State of Indiana,” said Vaughn Winslow, a self-identified Kokomo High School Wildcats fan. “These small schools, I see where they come from, but I don’t see where the fairness is today.”

Once everyone had a chance to speak, Cox thanked the crowd once again and encouraged them to file their ballots in the back of the auditorium. Cox said the response was similar to the ones he and Delph had received elsewhere.

“There’s passion on both sides of the issue,” Cox said. “The reality is the board of directors made a decision based on the member schools. Fifteen years later, most of the public has accepted it, may not like it, but they’ve accepted it.”

STATE
In late March, the Loogootee faithful made the trek to Indianapolis for the third time in the school’s history.

The Lions swept past in-class sectional rivals Barr-Reeve High School and Shoals High School, moved on from Evansville Day School and Orleans High School on their way to the semi-state game, pushed by Edinburgh High School and finally made it to the state championship game against the Rockville High School Rox on March 24 at Bankers Life Fieldhouse in Indianapolis.

All around downtown Indianapolis, fans clad in Loogootee black and gold filed into Bankers Life Fieldhouse. They filled the arena to the rafters in their designated fan section. The Lions fans took up about a quarter of the seats in the fieldhouse.

“If there’s empty seats, can we move down there?” asked one fan in the nosebleed seats.

“I’m sorry,” said the usher in a green vest. “They won’t let you.”

“That makes no sense, the entire town of Loogootee fits in here,” he said.

Just before tipoff, the lights dimmed. The Black Eyed Peas’ “Let’s Get it Started” blasted from speakers with thumping bass, a far cry from the pep band sounds in Loogootee.

The Lions stayed ahead for the first half. Fans were on their feet, shouting, screaming profanities at Wagoner, at the referees. Cheerleaders led the chants that Lions fans had been shouting for years.

“L-I-O-N-S, what does that spell? Lions!” the crowd shouted in unison.

With two minutes left in the game, Indiana state troopers and IHSAA officials lined up behind the basket with the championship trophy and medals, awaiting the end of the game.

With less than a minute to play, Rockville made a few lucky shots, tying the game at 50 points. Loogootee and Rockville fans were on their feet, hands were clenched, fingers crossed.

The Lions got up 52-50, but a Rockville player took the ball back and put it up for two points, tying the game again with 25 seconds.

18 seconds: Loogootee junior Will Nonte responded, making it 54-52.

4.3 seconds: Ackerman was fouled and taken to the line again, putting his team up by five.

The Lions were roaring. They knew it was finished. They knew the boys in gold had finally brought home the state title, and they could not be more proud.

LIVING LEGENDS
That afternoon the Lions headed home, all 98 and nine-tenths miles from the massive Bankers Life Fieldhouse to the miniscule Jack Butcher Arena.

Fans, players and coaches came down U.S. Highway 50, windows down, standing in the back of pick-up trucks, shouting and cheering in an impromptu victory parade once they reached Loogootee.

In the shadow of the Loogootee water tower, painted like a basketball, Ackerman held the trophy for the crowd to see, the net through which he dropped the winning shot draped around his neck.

They were living legends, their spot forever reserved in the trophy case of memory.

“It was just great,” Wagoner said. “It was something that these kids will remember forever. That it is over was kind of hard to understand.”

Today, the evidence of the championship is still coming slowly. Wagoner said a huge map of Indiana is being painted now on the wall of Jack Butcher Arena to commemorate the champions.

“I don’t know exactly how big, but the biggest map we’ve got, it’ll be bigger than that,”
he said.

Championship rings are also on order and will arrive in the next few weeks for the players and coaches.

“That’ll probably be when it becomes real,” Wagoner said. “When we get our rings in and people start wearing their rings around, that’ll be when it sinks in.”

Loogootee High School is the defending state champions for Class A boys’ basketball. It doesn’t come with the dramatic storyline of The Milan Miracle, but it does come with rings and banners and parades and pride.

“We are state champs, and that is all that matters,” Wagoner said.

It’s a discussion that surely will continue in high school bleachers, in gymnasiums and locker rooms after practice and games, and in the statehouse and administration
offices.

But, for now, it seems that multiple-class basketball isn’t going anywhere.

“I’ve been to one class and I remember the excitement, and now I know what it’s like with classes,” Wagoner said. “It wouldn’t make any sense to go back now.”