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Since River Valley is dragging their feet on getting a football coach, are they going after a soccer coach? Would be a great time to seek one!

I'm not very familiar with the River Valley sports programs or school board, but getting a soccer coach to start a program is awesome. I think every school should have a soccer program and it would be a great endeavour for River Valley.Also it would give other area teams another team to compete with.

I knew they would eventually bail on the football program.

MarauderMadness wrote: ↑Thu Apr 27, 2023 1:25 pm I knew they would eventually bail on the football program.

RV is not bailing on the football program. There are a group of parents trying to get a soccer program started.

Soccer can hurt football at certain schools. River Valley is NOT one of those schools.

We will see if soccer comes to RV though. Still in process.

RVRaiderFan wrote: ↑Thu May 04, 2023 10:21 am

MarauderMadness wrote: ↑Thu Apr 27, 2023 1:25 pm I knew they would eventually bail on the football program.

RV is not bailing on the football program. There are a group of parents trying to get a soccer program started.

Soccer can hurt football at certain schools. River Valley is NOT one of those schools.

We will see if soccer comes to RV though. Still in process.

This is such an archaic mindset. Soccer won't hurt football. Unless your school has 22 boys in it.

OSH wrote: ↑Mon May 08, 2023 12:10 pm

RVRaiderFan wrote: ↑Thu May 04, 2023 10:21 am

MarauderMadness wrote: ↑Thu Apr 27, 2023 1:25 pm I knew they would eventually bail on the football program.

RV is not bailing on the football program. There are a group of parents trying to get a soccer program started.

Soccer can hurt football at certain schools. River Valley is NOT one of those schools.

We will see if soccer comes to RV though. Still in process.

This is such an archaic mindset. Soccer won't hurt football. Unless your school has 22 boys in it.

I dont believe my statement was old-fashioned at all. I know the boys we have at RVHS and the boys that we have coming through RV Junior High.

Over the next 4-5-6 years, the kids that are wanting to get a soccer program are not kids that would normally play football. The kids that are going to play football will stick with football.

I understand down the road that could change. Just looking at right now.

I think for D2 and smaller schools, soccer absolutely hurts football. Not immediately, but parents often make choices in what to invest their kids' time in based on their future high school opportunities. It's not that football players will quit to play soccer. It's about the future classes: the kids that are just starting to get serious about sports. It's hard to justify joining a travel soccer team if your local high school doesn't even have a team—so why push your athletic kid toward soccer in that case?

Every small school football team needs all the good athletes they can get. The soccer-obsessed families were maybe never going to play football, but the basketball families often like to keep their athletes busy in the Fall, and soccer is often more appealing than football as a second sport.

I contend that it's a good thing though— give the families more choices, and let's invest resources in the programs that are more important to students.

Soccer does not hurt football. Stop with that mess. There's more than enough kids to play most sports, obviously depending on the school sizes. It's not hard to have teams that are 16-20 players in soccer, and football is completely unaffected.

Maybe every school should go to one sport per gender per season. That way people don't get offended by kids choosing to play what they want when they want.

NFHS saw participation declines in 2018-19 and in 2021-22. The first decline (2018-19) was the first NFHS participation decline in 30 years. Post-pandemic decline was another 4% from 2018-19. This isn't positive. And, continuing to say stupid things like "xxxxx sport hurts participation in xxxxx sport" doesn't help anyone. Especially in an age where mental health and physical activity both need more encouragement than ever before.