By: Ella Kate McCord
Everyone knows about Lovett, Westminster, and Pace moving to 4a at the same time. Some teams are not seeing a huge impact, while others are starting to experience what 4a really means.
“The two sports that will probably have the biggest impact will be football and basketball,” Mr. Nelson, the athletic director, said. “but I have all the confidence in our coaches that we can continue to improve and be competitive.”
Head football coach Mike Muschamp acknowledged that “we are in a classification where most of the schools have a student body population that’s double ours, or close to that. They have more kids to pick from for the different sports teams that they provide.”
Still, Coach Muschamp said he’s doing what he’s always done, coaching his players and leaning on his experience to know how to get them to succeed. He has coached at the college level and at other big high schools. After thirty- six years–eighteen of them at this school, this season is “just another typical season.”
Sophomore Landyn Murphy said that he did not see any difference and that they were finding success still. He also talked about many highlights that have happened in the last couple of games. “It’s been really good, we won our last game,” he says. Sophomore Casani Bartlett next to him said for the upcoming season he “just wants to make sure we know what we are doing and stay after practice to get in extra work.”
When I asked Coach Muschamp about how this change was going to affect the way that the boys prepare he responded rather calmly and simply, “We are just going to do what we do.” He went on to explain that they have not done anything differently than what they have done in the past. “We have not really talked about it being the 4a change other than we need to be in great condition and physical shape,” he said.
The two players Casani and Landyn had the same feelings towards this and when asked if they noticed any changes in the division they simply said, “No!”
Since we started off this football season with really tough rivalries like Pace, GAC, and Westminster, the players had strong motivation to work hard in the summer. Coach Muschamp said he always likes to have these games closer to the beginning because he can see the work ethic go up when the players have something to work towards.
A few weeks ago, we played McDonough high school and did very well against this tough team. We definitely saw what a true 4a school looked like considering their population was almost double ours. “As we go through the meat of this schedule though, that is the concern that I have that week in week out playing these schools are going to be so much bigger,” Muschamp said.
Football is definitely a team sport and the bond between the players really matters for success. When asked what it is like to be on a football team Casani told me, “It’s a great brotherly experience and there is a lot of support involved especially from the seniors.”
I also checked in with Reid Hamilton, the seventh/eighth-grade football coach and boys varsity soccer coach to learn how the middle school football teams are handling the new division change. After all, those players are going to be coming to the Upper School.
Coach Hamilton has not noticed any big changes due to 4a because “our opponents don’t change based on 2a to 4a. We just kinda play whoever we can get because there aren’t that many 8th grade teams in the area,” he said.
The challenging thing about having two separate teams for the seventh and eighth grades is that not every school does that. Meaning, other schools have a combined team for the seventh and eighth-grade boys. Because the eighth-grade boys are further along in their growth process, it can be very dangerous for the seventh graders to go up against them.
Of course, football is not the only sport contending with the division shift. Coach Rooney, the head volleyball coach, is new to Lovett and has only been coaching for four years, but she played volleyball in college and previously went overseas to play in England. The volleyball team has also been going up against Pace and Westminster like they did last year, and along with football the middle of the season and state will be their biggest challenge. They have not had any issues yet but as the season goes on their competition will begin to get harder.
Head softball coach, Perelini Bush, thinks the division shift has had the positive result of challenging the players a bit more “because the way we look at it is almost like we are playing ourselves compared to the region before us.” She told me that these players have already experienced some of the bigger schools and that “it is forcing them to fight more.”
Looking ahead to the spring, Coach Hamilton said their soccer region will not change that much in that it’s going to come down to Pace and us. The difference is that Pace and Lovett were the best in the state in 2a and we played each other in the region and then we played each other in the state championship.” Now, he said, the competitor pool will be expanding. Now, we have Westminster and other big schools who we will also have to compete with at state.
For soccer, they are not looking to change anything in preparation for the new season because they have always had a hard schedule that prepares them well for state. “Can we make the playoffs?” he said. “The answer should be 100% yes, we should still do well within our region but it’s going to be a totally different approach to the playoffs because we could lose any round.”
In the end, it just comes down to the fact that all of our teams no matter what sport are going to have to fight for their spot so that we can be successful. “There is just more competition and talent,” Coach Hamilton.
