Today, the LVRJ ran a piece on how Bishop Gorman, Las Vegas's only Catholic High School and how they dominate some sports in Nevada.
From the LVRJ: When the Nevada Interscholastic Activities Association's board of
control holds its summer meeting Monday and Tuesday at The Orleans, its
agenda runs the gamut from the pledge of allegiance and regular reports
to action items on new member schools and liability insurance.
At some point during those two days, however, the body that governs
the state's high school sports is likely to acknowledge the 500-pound
gorilla in the room and move to a continuing discussion of the question
that has perplexed the NIAA and many of its large member schools and
their fans for the better part of the past decade:
What to do with Bishop Gorman?
Yes, the Gaels, the private school and sports juggernaut, nationally
ranked more often than not; seven straight Nevada baseball crowns, three
boys basketball championships in the past four years, and four of the
five most recent large-school football titles - the last one a 72-28
mauling of northern power Reed High School of Sparks in the 2011
championship game.
http://www.lvrj.com/sports/bishop-gorman-what-is-fair-160156765.html
The article goes on and talks about player recruitment by Gorman and the CCSD schools and how some kids supposedly get free or severely reduced tuition and other advantages. Yadada. Face it, all high schools in Las Vegas try and recruit athletes, whether they say so or not. Bishop Gorman does it and CCSD schools do it. I am a CCSD teacher and while I personally have not seen it, I certainly have heard the stories.
But the recruiting and tuition breaks by Gorman are not the reason why Gorman gets the good athletes. First, Gorman does not have the behavior problems CCSD schools have, so they get the kids and parents want their kid to go to a school that is safe and have good academics.
But even that doesn't explain why Gorman is so much better.
The main reason and what the LVRJ leaves out is that Bishop Gorman gets the best coaches in the area. Gorman can pay whatever they want to a coach. They can make a coach a full time position, if they wanted.
CCSD schools, on the other hand, can only pay their coaches what the union contract allows. I think a football coach makes about $5000 a season or less. Gorman can pay their coach $15,000 or $50,000 if they want to make it a full time position or whatever they want to pay. Their is no union contract involving Gorman athletics. In CCSD, there are some good coaches out there and there are also some coaches who don't know what they are doing because they just want to make a few bucks on the side.Further, coaches are spread throughout all the CCSD high schools, so maybe a high school may get a good coach or two or three but usually not more than that. Then the inner city schools that have a hard time attracting teachers also tend to attract to the poorer coaches. There is a reason why Palo Verde, Las Vegas High and other schools in better part of town also do good in athletics- they tend to attract the best coaches. Not all the time, but most of the time.
So, CCSD and the Northern Nevada schools can bitch about Bishop Gorman all they want but their is not much they can do about it except get better and beat them fair or unfair and square.
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Dan, for a CCSD teacher, you speak very highly of Bishop Gorman. Are you a coach? The reason why I ask is because you say Gorman has the best coaches which is completely false. At the high school level, if you have great talent you will most definitely be successful. Thus the great success at Bishop Gorman. For example, their football offensive line reads like a college program on paper (height & weight). As far as basketball, if you have 4 players on your team 6'6" and above you will definitely have an advantage because it's rare in high school to have that type of height on a roster.
ReplyDeleteAgain, if you are a CCSD employee (as you say), and you've been in this city for over 10 years, then you know that what you speak about is completely false.
I am not a coach at Bishop Gorman, but the reason why I say this is because they can pay their coaches whatever they want- they are not beholden to union contracts.
ReplyDeleteAre their individuals in CCSd who are better coaches at Gorman, maybe, but as a team of coaches, they probably have the best.
Okay, I will submit to you that other public schools "recruit." But you are an idiot if you think this "recruiting" has any impact on the type of recruiting that Gorman does. They have a $40 mill dollar athletic facility and a full Nike sponsorship that is comparable to a college. This is why the kids "choose" to come to Gorman. If you think they don't have a competitive advantage, then you are seriously mistaken, or are a Gorman grad.
DeleteDan 6'6 and 300 lbs doesn't guarantee success. Cheyenne has three times the enrollment that Truckee HS has, outweighed their linemen by an average of 50 lbs and had a legit D1 running back....and lost. Gorman built it, now they come. They no longer need to convince any kid to come play at Gorman. All the kids coming up know what Gorman has to offer. A lot of support (admin, parent, booster) to their athletic programs, particularly football. The parents know their kid won't have to deal with fights, gangs and distractions during school that are a daily at publics. While it must be noted that drugs and sex are just as prevalent at Gorman than the publics but that's everywhere, good kids will be good kids no matter where they go but the distractions or lack of make a huge selling point to parents.
ReplyDeleteThe best facilities and a national audience that'll get the recruiters attention more than playing for Rancho. Kids for a decade kids have gotten into football program schools to raise their chances of getting college offers.
Kids go to Palo and take Japanese to get zoning exceptions, Liberty because they're a "college prep" now. Rancho's baseball team is made up of 99% kids in their magnet program. It goes on and on.
There are public schools that have duplicated the culture of Bishop Gorman and found a lot of success. Green Valley, Palo, Coronado, Centennial have been in more state tournaments in last two years (Basketball, football, soccer mens and womens, softball, baseball etc...) it takes parent, player, administration and community support to build success and those are schools that do it hence their success.