by tomoore » Sun Oct 30, 2022 12:57 am
Logan (the high school) has been in a tough dilemma for getting firm working relationships with other schools (across all activities) for a while now. It's not from a lack of trying on Logan's part. The problem is two-fold: 1) ever since the demise of the old Southeastern Ohio Athletic League [SEOAL] c. 2016 (what was the oldest public high school athletic league in Ohio, a league that at one time spanned Zanesville to Marietta, down to Gallipolis and Portsmouth), the schools' athletic department has been homeless. Due to the school's size, they kept getting rejected from the Tri-Valley Conference (Athens, Jackson, Meigs, and Vinton Counties) for sports (or so the story goes.) The only other possibility for sports was the Mid-State League (which didn't want them for a couple reasons.) So, basically, they've been without a paddle when it comes to forming actual bonds with other schools that are within a decent drive to them. 2) There is not only a distance issue, but also a commuting issue, that has also hurt Logan when it comes to looking at the Columbus area for relationship-forming. The distance is kind of self-explanatory if you look at where Logan is compared to Columbus, yes, but due to a really outdated (if not supremely screwed-up) design of US-33 on both sides of the 270 interchange down on the southeast side of Columbus there are massive traffic issues. I know that there are many districts up on the 270 corridor (more so points far north, west and southwest on the ring) that will just not approve transportation requests, and will tell their AD's to not schedule away games there, to Logan, because getting through that intense thick of congestion at rush-hour times after school incurs a unusually high amount of risks (time concerns, student safety as that particular stretch of 33 between 70 and Gender Road/SR674 has a ton of accidents in the afternoon.)
I know the above is sort of "inside baseball" level discussion that addresses some things that don't seem directly pertinent to Logan's quiz bowl league prospects (I'll get to that here in a second.) The point behind all of ^that is to just give some context as to why they're largely in the bind that they are. The school has long been understood up my way, and even in its area, as its own metaphorical island -- a separation that wasn't by their own intention nor their own will, but rather a string of unfortunate circumstances that they had no ability (no matter how hard they wished) to meaningfully change nor lessen the impact of. It's been a struggle, to say the least.
The only league I can think of that would be a distant possibility for them would be the Mid-State Academic League. Mike Sedlack's e-mail is on the OAC website. Worth a shot. If Logan can't get into that, please know that its not out of a dislike or disinterest in Logan on anyone's part. The league runs on a particularly designed 16-team grid schedule incorporating tri-matches. I don't know if they have any openings (it simply can't run on 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22 or 23 schools.) If they have an opening, it's possible Logan could make it in. I can't speak for anyone in particular, but I imagine the Fairfield and Pickaway County schools would be fine with it. There are some Licking County schools, especially up by Newark, in it. I don't know if they'd be necessarily opposed, or not, but Mike could probably write a schedule that has Logan's hosting of a tri-match (every school hosts) be some schools closer to Logan (although that wouldn't be without some grinding to make the table work.)
Mid-State Academic League aside, Logan is finally joining an athletics league in the Fall of 2024 -- the Ohio Capital Conference. Now, the caveat and general disclaimer to that (worth pointing this out to square it up better with the context paragraphs earlier in this post) is the specific schools that will be in their part of the OCC are: Canal Winchester, Groveport-Madison, Lancaster, Newark, Pickerington Central, Reynoldsburg, and Teays Valley. The only school with a quiz bowl team is Teays Valley. So maybe an opportunity exists over the next couple years for the Logan and TV administrations, probably with the help of an individual actor (batsignal for Greg Bossick) to get the other schools to put a couple hundred bucks into making a no frills quiz bowl program so an OCC quiz bowl league comes to fruition.
Moore, T;
reader, Southeast Region and statewide (2015-present);
ex-player, William V. Fisher Catholic HS... allegedly (2010-2014);