It's amazing, the original topic was about considering a new sight for the 4A, 5A, and 6A state tournaments. Then, before we know it, there are too many classes and too many qualifiers and several opinions on how to make things better. After having been a KWCA officer for twelve years I can almost assure you the present system of four state tournaments with 16 qualifiers will remain the same. We as the KWCA fought hard for many years to get 5th and 6th place recognized, which meant eight more wrestlers in the state being awarded for their hard work. It would seem ludicrous to go to two classes and eliminate half the state placers. What we need to do at this juncture is find an acceptable place to hold the tournaments and concentrate our efforts on this and this only. As for my own personal opinion, I have coached in both 3A and 4A and found the experience at Fort Hays State in the late 70's and early 80's to be a positive one. I will vote to return 4A back to Hays.

First of all I didn't grow up in Kansas, so I guess I missed out on this great kansas tradition of 321a. And I've always wondered why Kansas was so much farther behind most of the other states in wrestling. But as I read this it's becoming pretty obvious what the problem is. You guy's could careless about promoting Kansas wrestling as a whole. I'm not saying everyone on here has that attitude, but there's enough of you to ruin it for everyone else. Kansas is mostly small communitys, so that means there's alot of smaller class schools. Which means the kids that live in the bigger towns get talked down on because they're in the minority.I don't see how seperating your classes is going to help Kansas wrestling. Grand state would be the best thing to happen to Kansas, because then you could recognize a kid for his talent, not for where he's from. And you wonder why Kansas doesn't have college wrestling. There's know support of wrestling as a state. There's to many little groups trying to say there better than everyone else. I can't speak for years past, but the only thing that stands out about 321A is they've got the best team inthe state with Hoxie. But I don't see anyone in 321A with thew exception of 1 or 2 wieghts that would win a grand state title. And truthfully as far as dueling the 5A/6A state champs 321A would'nt have a chance this year. I know this is going to make alot of people mad, and I'll probably get some nasty reply's, but oh well. Oh yea and just because you have more fish to wade through to get to the final's doesn't make you a better class than all the other's.

The reason 3-1A has the best state tourney is because of a lot of factors including great support of small home town fans, many of the best wrestlers in the state, as many as any other class but one of the things that makes it the best tournament is the atmosphere and focus on one class. I will bet you can't find two people who have been to both and does not think the single tourney at Hays far outshines 3 at Wichita.

I also love being able to watch all the different classes together in one building. But last year I couldn't hardly tell who was who from where I was sitting! And there were too many matches going on at once. Seems to me that we should be competing for the ultimate title of "Kansas Champion", not just class champion. Let's split the classes up, and have a Grand State!!!

K.C.- I am not trying to make this sound nasty, but what you wrote truly shows you are not from Kansas. Alot of people in Eastern Kansas truly do not understand what wrestling is like in Western Kansas. In the winter it is the #1 sport in many many places. Where I grew up we had more fans at our duals than went to the Basketball games. We did have Grand State and for some reason it was dropped (if anyone knows why could you enlighten me, I have heard theories but no true reason). Kansas does have some very successful wrestling programs, albeit at the Junior College level. The reason that we don't have a D-1 program is not about lack of support but Title IX and the almighty $$$$$. Try going out to Hays once and see what it is about before you start putting it down. I wrestled there and I wish every wrestler could have an experience like that. Remember this is about the wrestlers getting the best experience, not the fans (or cheerleaders for that matter). As far as Grand State Champions, how many of the wrestlers from Hoxie, Norton, Ulysses, Oakley, Trego, or Ellis have you actually seen wrestle? I am not saying they are better than everyone else, but again it depends on the year and the individual. 3-2-1A 145 has 2 or 3 wrestlers alone that could win a Grand State tourney.
Please don't take offense, but living in Eastern Kansas I have heard all this before, but always by people who had not experienced what happened out west.

KC,
"Kansas is so much farther behind some other states in wrestling"???

Coachtwink- No offense taken. I'm really not trying to run down the state tourny in Hays. And I really don't want to talk about who's better than who. I'd prefer the kid's decide that on the mat. I've not heard one thing bad about the Hay's tournament. It sounds like a great atmosphere for the kids. And as far as wrestling being important to western Kansas, thats pretty obvious, I mean they have there own state tounament out there. And I have seen the teams you mentioned wrestle. But, I've also seen alot of the 456A teams wrestle. It just seems to me that the state has a split down the middle so that one side of the state doesn't recognize the other side. There are alot of talented wrestlers in this state. I just don't think they get the recognition they deserve because of this split.

I would like to see 4A-5A-6A stay together and have it at the Topeka Expocenter, I have read alot about the feelings of be un-attached to the matches at the Colusieum and can empathize with it. I think the Expocenter would handle the event very well, I have been there during Kids State and Kids Nationals and we are talking about 4-5 times the number of wrestlers than what is at the High school state. The is never a problem during kids state and the people working the matches are top notch. Plus the Expocenter provides better viewing of the matches and a much more intimate setting for watching the matches.

K.C.-

You stated that Kansas wrestling was always "so far behind everyone else" in one of your previous posts. Fool, you CRAZY. I may be wrong, but didn't Kansas finish in the top 5 at folkstyle nationals last year? Weren't we somewhere up there for freestyle/greco too? Kansas is not far behind, in fact I'd say we help set the curve.

I would also like to stick up for the tiny guys here. I attend one of the biggest high schools in the state, and I can guarantee that there are at least 8 or so teams from 4/3/2/1A that could easily beat half of the 5A/6A teams in a dual or a tournament. Maybe it's from wrestling cows and tractors all their lives, but something makes those kids tough.

Yea, my son wrestled on the cadet team. I'm not talking about the talent of Kansas wrestlers, I'm talking about organization and Kansas backing all there kids not just the select few.

I love you guys from out of state critisizing Kansas wrestling. You like it so well in those other states go back there. I have coached teams against the best of Colorado, Oklahoma,and Iowa and I can tell youright now that there are good kids everywhere. Kansas put out Myron Roderick, Melvin Douglas, Pete Meringer (the first Olympic Champ) Eric Aikens, the Duel brothers who both wrestled at Oklahoma State with great success, and a host of others and have many ranked wrestlers right now in major colleges. Our kids always compete very well at the National Tourneys, and you can tell where I think you should stick your opionion of Kansas Wrestling. I am proud of what we have done here and some of us have devoted our lives to it. If you think it is so darn bad maybe you should talk to some of us who have been here all of our lives and find out about the history of it before you go off on a bash fest of us. There are a heck of a lot of Iowa and Oklahoma state champs who do nothing in Division I wrestling and that doesnt shed a negative light on what they do. Where you from? If you want to bash us tell us where you are from so we can have a shot at you!!

The guy has a point. i think marketing and publicity wise, wrestling sorta gets the big screw in kansas. Seems like baseball, football and basketball take up whatever TV and radio time that is offered for high school sports. Maybe we get a regular season duel and mo-kan duel here and there on metro sports, but hardly any coverage compared to other sports. And you hardly see a highlight of a wrestler on metro sports, but u see plenty of a basketball team. Also Iowa televises the entire state championship, which my coach taped and i watched it. It was run really nicely and u could tell the whole state backed the sport with zeal. From what ive read above, the 456A tourney is hurting the publicity of kansas wrestling. Its so much more fan friendly to have the whole audience focus on one finals match. It would be nice if we could get a single match finals going instead of three wrestling at the same time.

Don't rely on what you hear, go to it and see for yourself. Hey Missouri has all theres in one place, Iowa has several in one place so does Nebraska and Colorado. Try it and see for yourself. Oklahoma has far more pub on those other sports too. We are not alone in that regard. Heck go by a Des Moines newspapaper, Girls basketball gets more pub in Iowa than wrestling does. Go see for yourself and see what you think of it. 5 and 6A may be bad for wrestling huh, check out where the ranked national wrestlers came from in major colleges right now, Roberson, Maines, Johnston all wrestled in that bad for Kansas wrestling 5 and 6 A state tourney as did Aikens and Douglas. See what it is for yourself.

As far as publicity it really depends on the place. My hometown (in Western Kansas) puts every single tournament on the radio-live. Also the State semifinals and Finals are on TV live and then also played several times during the month. It just depends on the area and the priorities.