Football Demographics

[mdfootball]

Just curious, what are the make up of the top teams in the preseason poll, demographically-wise? I have heard that Southlake Carroll is a very rich area, are a lot of the other top teams in wealthy areas as well? Thanks

[mdfootball]

should this have gone to the football forum??

[twcpfan1]

Maybe so

But in answer to your original question:

I'm sure Income per Household has a lot to do with it. But in reality, it's the areas that have a combination of the best athletes and Community support.

I don't think, Lufkin, Longview or Tyler can be considered terribly affluent areas. But East Texas football typically has great athletes and community support. And the quality of their programs reflect that.

[LP-79]

I know that East Texas is not considered a affluent area mostly middle class and lower. However as far as athletic teams not just football But baseball, girls softball, and boys and girls basketball there are some very very good kids on the teams and they all have rabid fans. As an example 2 3A basketball teams can't play at their schools when they face one another, they play at a Junior college gym, not just for the extra room but vandalism control. One girl on Huntingtons 3A state softball championship team went over 2 months I believe without allowing an earned run. As far as football go to any town in East Texas on a Friday night. Most people will be at a game.

[DrEdward]

should this have gone to the football forum??

No, it's fine here.

[AHSeagles]

In West Texas it's community support and dedication to football. Abilene and Permian don't get that many great athletes (Don't get me wrong we do get some, but we don't tend to have teams with 5-6 D1 signees) but we do get great support from the community and also all of the best athletes in these schools play football only and if they play another sport it's usually a spring sport such as baseball. In Abilene most of the skill position guys run track and the linemen do power lifting. Basketball suffers greatly because these boys are so caught up in trying to be great in football that they'd rather do off season workouts than go play round ball and be in fear of not getting a shot on the field. Also it's football all year round. After the season, it's off season, then spring ball, then 7 on 7 in the summer, and all this time they're doin "voluntary" lifting after school and throughout the summer time.

[mdfootball]

a couple follow ups,
Do the feeder middle schools have tackle football? Also, what is the deal with the athletic period? do all schools have that, and what does it usually consist of? Coming from md, this is all so new to me, spring football and the athletic periods and the 20,000 seat stadiums

[dada]

a couple follow ups,
Do the feeder middle schools have tackle football? Also, what is the deal with the athletic period? do all schools have that, and what does it usually consist of? Coming from md, this is all so new to me, spring football and the athletic periods and the 20,000 seat stadiums

The middle schools play just like the big boys. Here is some 7th grade action:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qf-t_QAPSdY

[AHSeagles]

a couple follow ups,
Do the feeder middle schools have tackle football? Also, what is the deal with the athletic period? do all schools have that, and what does it usually consist of? Coming from md, this is all so new to me, spring football and the athletic periods and the 20,000 seat stadiums

Not only do the feeder middle schools play tackle football, they also use the same system and start with the basic plays that the high school uses. I don't think I've heard of a team in the state that doesn't have an athletic period. During the season when i played we always did non contact stuff and went over plays and formation and that sort of thing and did our conditioning then as well. In the off season its weights and agilities.

[DrEdward]

Below are some of the demographics for a few of the North Texas communities. Not that these are for the cities, not for the school attendance zone, so the correspondence to the high school is not a perfect match:

Southlake Plano Euless Colleyville

Median Household Income $162,572 $ 97,402 $61,275 $145,117
% White 92.0 74.9 68.4 90.7
% Black 1.4 5.0 6.5 3.2
% Latino 3.7 10.1 13.3 3.2
Median Age 36.7 34.1 32.2 40.0
% Families 92.9 74.9 60.5 90.9

I have included Heritage, even though they are not among the preseason ranked teams, simply as a comparison to Southlake. The income level is roughly comparable as is the overall demographic patterns in the communities. Yet, Heritage has not been anywhere as remotely successful in football as has Carroll. So there is more to football success than simply an income effect. I suspect that the income effect is more of an indirect one in that it allows the young men in the program the opportunities to attend summer camps at colleges and, in some cases, get some individual coaching. Of course, for anyone who has ever watched a part of a Todd Dodge football camp, there is an wide variety of boys there from all sorts of family backgrounds, so it is not clear that the income effect in that area is all that large, although I do suspect it is positive.

As we have discussed previously, the facilites at Carroll are moderate in comparison to other districts; they are not bad at all, but hardly over the top. So that is not where the income effect manifests itself. Where the effect probably shows up the most is not really in monetary terms at all, but rather in the expectations that these young men experience from the community and their families. The community itself is clearly well-educated and that is a major and fundamental determinant of the economic level which can be observed. The families mostly are professionals and accordingly have the same type of expectations for their children. They grow up being expected to do well in school academically and in their extracurricular activities as well; they are expected to go on to college; and they ovewhelming meet and even exceed such expectations.

Yet it is clearly possible to do quite well in football without the levels of income shown above, even though all are above the national average. Certainly families can have high expectations for their children and not have high incomes. One of the things that all these schools/communities have in common is the percentage of housholds living as families, especailly as compared to the national averages. That alone is a pretty good indicator of stability and contributes to the success of all the programs.

[DrEdward]

Sorry about the spacing in the pevious post folks. I keep trying to get it to look correct in tabular form and it simply keeps eliminating my spacing. Oh well.

[pied]

Dr. Edward, see if this looks ok.

......................................Southlake... ...Plano.......Euless......Colleyville

Median HouseholdIncome....$162,572.....$ 97,402.....$61,275.....$145,117
% White................................92.0......... ...74.9.........68.4............90.7
% Black...................................1.4....... ......5.0...........6.5..............3.2
% Latino..................................3.7....... ....10.1..........13.3..............3.2
Median Age.............................36.7...........34. 1..........32.2............40.0
% Families...............................92.9....... ...74.9...........60.5...........90.9

[DrEdward]

Again, thanks for cleaning up my mess.

[mdfootball]

thanks for the breakdown. I had always heard that southlake was a quite wealthy community. Obviously, any program that has had success will get there kids out for football, but among low-income kids, it is not that easy. To change the topic, what is the deal with athletic period? Is it just like any other class, does every team have one? To me, all this stuff is so foreign. But it sounds great, and I would love to have some of it here in maryland.

[AHSeagles]

thanks for the breakdown. I had always heard that southlake was a quite wealthy community. Obviously, any program that has had success will get there kids out for football, but among low-income kids, it is not that easy. To change the topic, what is the deal with athletic period? Is it just like any other class, does every team have one? To me, all this stuff is so foreign. But it sounds great, and I would love to have some of it here in maryland.

Every team I know of has an athletic period. In Abilene, our athletic period for all sports is 4th period, which is right before lunch. During football season the varsity does non contact drills and run through plays that way the coaches can do a little bit of focusing on the JV teams, whereas they're just scout team after school. During the off season they hit the weights hard and alternate different groups on different days between the weight room and agilities, conditioning, etc. Also all during this time there's "voluntary"(wink, wink) lifting going on after school.

[tayb]

thanks for the breakdown. I had always heard that southlake was a quite wealthy community. Obviously, any program that has had success will get there kids out for football, but among low-income kids, it is not that easy. To change the topic, what is the deal with athletic period? Is it just like any other class, does every team have one? To me, all this stuff is so foreign. But it sounds great, and I would love to have some of it here in maryland.

At my high school "Athletic Period" was different depending on which sport you played and what level you were in that sport. For instance varsity football had "athletic period" the first period of the day in the morning and either held practice before school and had "voluntary" lifting after school or had "voluntary" lifting before school and practice after school. Another example is Varsity baseball which had "voluntary" lifting before school, athletic period the last period of the day, and practice after school. It all just depends on what sport you are in.

Sports have athletic periods but other extracurricular activities have their designated periods as well. For example I was in marching band and we had an hour of practice once a week in the morning, practice during the first period of the day, and two hours of practice after school every day except Friday (game day).

The reason I am putting voluntary in quotes is because the UIL (University Interscholastic League) has rules that limit the amount of time a student can be REQUIRED to be at a practice and a loop hole for this is the whole voluntary thing. They can't MAKE you be there but they might bench you if you don't.

[GoOwls]

Maybe so

But in answer to your original question:

I'm sure Income per Household has a lot to do with it. But in reality, it's the areas that have a combination of the best athletes and Community support.

I don't think, Lufkin, Longview or Tyler can be considered terribly affluent areas. But East Texas football typically has great athletes and community support. And the quality of their programs reflect that.

I've always said that money has an influence on who wins state....in most occasions.

It's a lot easier to win state with steak and eggs in your belly for breakfast than with Frosted Flakes.

[mdfootball]

in regards to jv, how does that work? do they practice seperately? or do they serve as scout team for varsity? and what is the deal with two freshman teams or two jv teams? are these based on skill??

[DrEdward]

in regards to jv, how does that work? do they practice seperately? or do they serve as scout team for varsity? and what is the deal with two freshman teams or two jv teams? are these based on skill??

Can't speak for all the programs, as I am sure that different schools approach this differently. At Carroll, the jv does practice separately from the varsity, once they have been sorted out. However, members of the jv team as well as the rare freshman or two can also practice with the varsity on the scout teams and even more rare, make the varsity.

The number of freshman and jv teams is a function of the number of kids coming out for the program. Again in Carroll's case, there are typically two freshmen teams and those are most typically based on skill level at the time. Yet, there have certainly been cases where a player from the less skilled bunch as a freshman has gone on to become a starter at the varsity level. The JV bunch is typically broken down between sophomores and juniors, rather than by skill per se. Although it can readily be argued that there is a pretty high correlation between the skill level/physical ability of the individual and the age. But again, the number of teams is a function of the number of kids coming out for football.

[AHSeagles]

in regards to jv, how does that work? do they practice seperately? or do they serve as scout team for varsity? and what is the deal with two freshman teams or two jv teams? are these based on skill??

DrEdward has it right in that the number of teams you have is directly the cause of the number of athletes you have come out. At Abilene we have two freshman teams and they generally split those two teams up with all of the #1 players on team and rather than having the second best player as that kids back up, they let the #2 player start on the other team. We also have two JV teams and ours are mainly based on skill with the exception that all juniors on JV play with the better team.

JV practice schedule goes like this in Abilene. During the athletic period the varsity and JV practice separately. Then the two different JV teams work separately for a little bit, then the opposing defenses will work against the opposing offenses for a little bit. After school practice the JV teams scout for the varsity. Sometimes they'll have some varsity back ups also working with the JV's scouting, but it's pretty much exclusive JV scout work.

[HebronHawk]

Can't speak for all the programs, as I am sure that different schools approach this differently. At Carroll, the jv does practice separately from the varsity, once they have been sorted out. However, members of the jv team as well as the rare freshman or two can also practice with the varsity on the scout teams and even more rare, make the varsity.

The number of freshman and jv teams is a function of the number of kids coming out for the program. Again in Carroll's case, there are typically two freshmen teams and those are most typically based on skill level at the time. Yet, there have certainly been cases where a player from the less skilled bunch as a freshman has gone on to become a starter at the varsity level. The JV bunch is typically broken down between sophomores and juniors, rather than by skill per se. Although it can readily be argued that there is a pretty high correlation between the skill level/physical ability of the individual and the age. But again, the number of teams is a function of the number of kids coming out for football.

With 400 kids out for football at Hebron there are quite a few to work into practice. The three freshman teams practice together. The two JV teams work out separately most of the time and the best JV team works as a scout team for the varsity for game prep.

There is usually some mixed time during the Spring where the varsity and JV players can practice together.

[chhspantherfan]

Below are some of the demographics for a few of the North Texas communities. Not that these are for the cities, not for the school attendance zone, so the correspondence to the high school is not a perfect match:

Southlake Plano Euless Colleyville

Median Household Income $162,572 $ 97,402 $61,275 $145,117
% White 92.0 74.9 68.4 90.7
% Black 1.4 5.0 6.5 3.2
% Latino 3.7 10.1 13.3 3.2
Median Age 36.7 34.1 32.2 40.0
% Families 92.9 74.9 60.5 90.9

I have included Heritage, even though they are not among the preseason ranked teams, simply as a comparison to Southlake. The income level is roughly comparable as is the overall demographic patterns in the communities. Yet, Heritage has not been anywhere as remotely successful in football as has Carroll. So there is more to football success than simply an income effect. I suspect that the income effect is more of an indirect one in that it allows the young men in the program the opportunities to attend summer camps at colleges and, in some cases, get some individual coaching. Of course, for anyone who has ever watched a part of a Todd Dodge football camp, there is an wide variety of boys there from all sorts of family backgrounds, so it is not clear that the income effect in that area is all that large, although I do suspect it is positive.

As we have discussed previously, the facilites at Carroll are moderate in comparison to other districts; they are not bad at all, but hardly over the top. So that is not where the income effect manifests itself. Where the effect probably shows up the most is not really in monetary terms at all, but rather in the expectations that these young men experience from the community and their families. The community itself is clearly well-educated and that is a major and fundamental determinant of the economic level which can be observed. The families mostly are professionals and accordingly have the same type of expectations for their children. They grow up being expected to do well in school academically and in their extracurricular activities as well; they are expected to go on to college; and they ovewhelming meet and even exceed such expectations.

Yet it is clearly possible to do quite well in football without the levels of income shown above, even though all are above the national average. Certainly families can have high expectations for their children and not have high incomes. One of the things that all these schools/communities have in common is the percentage of housholds living as families, especailly as compared to the national averages. That alone is a pretty good indicator of stability and contributes to the success of all the programs.

While we have not had the successes of SLC, we also haven't been playing since 1963. SLC has developed a "first class" program starting in the elementary schools. Every campus' mascot is a dragon, every youth team is the dragons, and that promotes spirit and unity that is undeniable. I wholeheartedly applaud Jack Johnson(AD) and Bob Ledbetter(HC) for starting this. They raised the bar on expectations when SLC was still a 3A school. Expectations are the key and they do tie into demographics. Our district squandered the opportunity to build these expectations when they built the second HS (CHHS) and didn't seperate the feeder schools properly (IMO). I believe that we now have an AD (Ford) and HC (Fuller) that will turn the feeder programs around and start to develop those high expectations. We have it in the classroom and are starting to develop it in athletics. While I do not see a State Championship this year, I also didn't see a Regional run two years ago as possible. We will get there eventually as the talent is getting better every year.

[DrEdward]

While we have not had the successes of SLC, we also haven't been playing since 1963. SLC has developed a "first class" program starting in the elementary schools. Every campus' mascot is a dragon, every youth team is the dragons, and that promotes spirit and unity that is undeniable. I wholeheartedly applaud Jack Johnson(AD) and Bob Ledbetter(HC) for starting this. They raised the bar on expectations when SLC was still a 3A school. Expectations are the key and they do tie into demographics. Our district squandered the opportunity to build these expectations when they built the second HS (CHHS) and didn't seperate the feeder schools properly (IMO). I believe that we now have an AD (Ford) and HC (Fuller) that will turn the feeder programs around and start to develop those high expectations. We have it in the classroom and are starting to develop it in athletics. While I do not see a State Championship this year, I also didn't see a Regional run two years ago as possible. We will get there eventually as the talent is getting better every year.

Certainly agree that expectations of the boys for themselves, their families, the community, and the coaching staff matter a great deal. It took awhile for such to develop at Carroll, as for much of the period, Southlake was a small, largely rural community, with no great emphasis on football, per se. There was a really good rodeo team around, however. There was, however, an expectation and demand that the students would do well in the classroom and in whatever activities they entered into. Even into the early 90s, Carroll remained a 3A school, although it had certainly developed some significant expectations by then. But the Carroll community even then was far from the very affluent place it has become today. It took the addition of a dedicated coach to finally place Carroll over the top in football; Ledbetter was one of the keys, as was Steve Lineweaver. But the coaches (and the teachers) very much received the support of the community in their efforts and that, I believe, is one of the keys to really having a successful program on an ongoing basis. It is no guarantee of success, as clearly the players have to have the abilities and desires in the first place. But such community support and the development of those expectations for success are major contributors.