Glenbard West question
- Thread starter mc140
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I believe talent is at a low, and dealing with significant injuries. Bad combo
Hetlet is a very good coach and they will be in most games. Their game plan against York last year was very impressive.
The sophs are decent this year. They beat Loyola and Lyons. Lost to Batavia and DGN. All games were close. They are not developing the OL bulldozers they’ve had in the past. When you have little to no passing game at any level it’s gonna be tough.
Youth program has been way down in recent years. Still don’t see much light at the end of the tunnel based on current youth program results. I know that doesn’t always mean much but often times it does mean bad news for the high schools.
Every school in the Chicago area is going through demographic changes other than private schools and the wealthiest schools. I’ve actually done a ton of research on this and it’s astounding how much schools have changed in the last 20ish years.
I’ve always wondered about that-and the fresh/soph records. Schools seem much more aggressive about playing underclassmen on varsity than in the past. Glen Ellyn is smaller than many of the towns they play in youth and I don’t think the results have traditionally been all that great. The fresh/soph records generally have been though. Would be more concerned about the participation numbers. They were way, way, way down leading up to Covid and then spiked back up.
It's stunning really. Can even narrow it down to the last 10 years in many cases.
their youth program has been down for a long time. Before they would have 4 teams and every level. Now you’re lucky to have 2. That’s also including them getting kids from Glendale heights now since that program folded. So that’s kids that feed into glenbard south, west and some that go to East.
Also demographics in dupage have changed a lot and will continue to change.
I think the biggest thing for youth programs is just getting kids out and playing before hs is huge. In youth football right now everyone is trying to build super teams and it’s pointless. To use the PR travel hawks as an example a lot of those kids were from Norridge, Harwood heights and Chicago. Most of those kids are at ridgewood, st pats, nd or Taft now. Theirs several more examples I can give with programs doing the same thing. Where before the goal was to get kids that would feed into your hs
not trying to make this political at all. Just pointing out the change that’s going on in dupage
They are one of them. It’s gotten really bad in Pop Warner, AYF and UYF. The Elmhurst Bears 13u team is mostly kids from proviso. I don’t know if they even have a kid from Elmhurst
To add a some thought to the declining numbers, do you think part of it is the coaching that is encountered both on the teams they play for and the opponents they are playing? There are some towns that I will simply refuse to work for, because their entire organization is poorly run.
What is going on is people are trying to form super teams so they can go to nationals. Elmhurst has 2 teams at 13u. One team is a hand picked team with kids from all over. The coach from proviso brought his best players there and cut the weaker kids lose. This is happening all over. Programs aren’t worried about increases their numbers. It’s very common for teams to limit their roster to their hand picked 16 kids
I’m most familiar with bgyfl. Park ridge falcons are bgyfl but they aren’t dominant. From what I understand the other Park Ridge team that was also named the Falcons but now is something else, is likely taking a lot of the top bgyfl park ridge program’s talent. Weird story there.
I would say the top bgyfl programs: Palatine, Downers, Wheaton. Tri-city usually has a TON of kids at each level but not the most dominant. Elmhurst Eagles are down. I think they lose kids to Bears each year. Bears has a decent amount of Elmhurst kids. It’s a feeder team for IC. Arlington Cowboys is not good, they’ve gotten decimated by the Arlington Dawgs, feeder for Hersey in Pop Warner. Glen Ellyn has some talent but you don’t see them at the highest level very often. They tend to be in d2(between lowest and highest levels of bgyfl).
Your old school bgyfl programs like Bartlett, Carol Stream, Lombard Falcons and Bloomingdale tend to dominate the D2 level. The talent isn’t great. Rarely do they get bumped up to the gold d1 (highest) level. When I was a kid Bloomingdale was unreal. Now? Not so much. Still some talented kids but not enough to dominate.
Sad to see the Hanover Park Hurricanes, a once dominant bgyfl program is no longer in bgyfl. Man when I was a kid they were an awesome program. As others have said demographic changes have shifted that area.
Another once proud program was Bensenville Bandits. They used to be great in the 80s and 90s. Went to KC a few times in pop warner. Bensenville was a blue collar town. Now it has also shifted with less kids coming out and when a kid is really good they end up at IC. Bandits are gone and been replaced by Bensenville Raiders. They were asked to leave by bgyfl after not winning more than a game or two in the entire organization.
Now that I think about it, all of those programs that are down tend to follow the trend where their high schools are these days.
Carol Stream down- GBN down
Bloomingdale down- lake park down
Hanover park gone- lake park down
Bartlett down- Bartlett HS down
Palatine, Wheaton and Downers all very good if you look at the standings of the top teams in each division. Biggest issue is that they all feed into different high schools so the talent doesn’t always get to the same high schools.
BGYF seems to be more old school with community based teams while some of the other leagues are similar to AAU basketball in that they are a collection of “all stars” from all over the place competing for “national” championships.
Bgyfl programs do it right. I don’t know much about tcyfl but it looks like that’s also a solid league. It makes no sense for kids from Kankakee to play for Joliet and kids from Elgin to play for a team out of country club hills. You would think people would realize that these national championships are just a money grab. Not to mention I don’t see how it helps develop players when you are on a team that has kids from all over the Chicagoland area and you’re destroying local teams.
when you are on a team that has kids from all over the Chicagoland area and you’re destroying local teams.
LOL they don't care about local teams! This also helps the Catholic schools when it comes to recruiting. If you have the studs in one spot the easier it is. I'm sure the CCL coaches have wonderful relationships with all these all star programs. Kudos to them for getting after it! Glad ESL doesn't have to deal with this treachery or changing demographics 😂 GO FLYERS 🔶🔷🔶🔷🔶
LOL they don't care about local teams! This also helps the Catholic schools when it comes to recruiting. If you have the studs in one spot the easier it is. I'm sure the CCL coaches have wonderful relationships with all these all star programs. Kudos to them for getting after it! Glad ESL doesn't have to deal with this treachery or changing demographics 😂 GO FLYERS 🔶🔷🔶🔷🔶
How is helping ccl programs that the Midwest hawks 13u team had qbs from Huntley and lasalle Peru. It’s not about player development or even getting players are to hs. It’s for parents and coaches to relive their glory days.
Maybe the difference between those programs is they feed into multiple hs and will just have more kids
Wheaton rams - wws, wn, west Chicago
Downers - dgn, dgs
Palatine - palatine, fremd
Tri city- scn, sce, Batavia and Geneva
Last I heard carol stream was having trouble fielding teams.
I know oak park has a good amount of kids but they lose a lot to Fenwick
It’s a race to the middle in BGYFL. The big towns are forced to field two teams at a level. While towns with 1 team can petition and go to silver.
I know the 13u team added a kid from park ridge and a few other from different towns. I actually thought bgyfl was strict with recruiting from towns in the league
The problem is the size difference in programs.
Carol stream for example is the feeder program for gbn
Wheaton rams is the youth program for 3 different high schools and will draw a lot more kids.
10 years ago a lot of these program would field 3-4 teams at every level. I also remember when park ridge had enough kids to have a house league and also a travel team that was in pop Warner.
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