By Tom Wheeler
I’m getting close. I hate to admit it, but just maybe this four-class system is OK.
When you’re young you are never wrong and if you are you sure never admit it. When you’re old, you realize there are two sides to every situation and “your” side may just be wrong. I’ve been against the four-class system since it began. What about Cobden’s run to state I would say or my Foxes of Mcleansboro’s run in 1962. Even the two classes got Dick Corn a championship so I learned to appreciate the two classes. But I am just not good at “change”
The past couple weeks I watched Nashville win a 2A regional over a very good Sesser-Valier-Waltonville team, and everyone knows where Wayne Harre’s “11 country girls” finished. I watched Randy Smithpeter’s Harrisburg Bulldogs win the Eldorado regional over another left-handed ex-Fox, Ron Winemiller’s Rangers of Benton and then the next night I suffered Steeleville’s win over our Christopher Bearcats, (you see I did have a ‘dog’ in that fight.)
I watched the excitement at all three places and the atmosphere at Waltonville was as great as any I had ever been part of, one class or 100 classes. It was more than standing room only, and you could have heard the crowd at the square in Mt. Vernon. The comment I heard was “why have the regional at such a small gym” because everyone who wanted to come to the game couldn’t get in.” This is probably true, but I will also say that they could have had the tournament at any of the other five schools and that school would have had the same problem. Waltonville Athletic Director Eric Witges went out of his way to make the tournament enjoyable. (OK, let’s give credit to the Waltonville Mafia who also helped, Pennington and son, Haley and son, Eric’s dad, Harper etc.) My only complaint to coach Witges was that the 45 minutes after the three-point contest and before the teams could take the floor for the game there was nothing going on. He could have had the man with the “fiddle” — Waltonville’s Nathan Kabat entertain the gigantic crowd with a little Charlie Daniels. Young Kabat did his rendition of the National Anthem each night and seemed to get better as the crowds got bigger. Basketball was not the only talent on display at “Ed Belva Arena” last week.
- As I told my grandson Hunter (a freshman reserve on the Christopher team) on Sunday, no one could describe what it was like Friday night. Being an underclassman on both teams in that kind of atmosphere had to be a great motivation to work hard this summer (and maybe shoot a lot of free throws). No one was any prouder of Eric Stallman’s Bearcats who had not been in a regional final since 1992 when the week before no one gave them a chance having to play the home team who had the No. 1 seed and had beaten the Cats twice at Christopher. In the Championship game the Cats were down 5 with 45 seconds to go and somehow tied the game sending it into overtime. In overtime the Warriors shot the “3” and that was the difference, and they also made 8 of 11 free throws in the OT.
So yes, four classes may be OK. Today’s 2A has not changed much from the two-class system. Of the eight 1A schools in our sectionals at Hardin County and Altamont, I think only a couple would still be playing depending on where everyone was sent. So Peoria look out because Class 1A is alive and well in Southern Illinois.
But, having the tournament in Peoria instead of Champaign, that’s another article.
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