Posted: 2/18/04

SEC turns down Cretin-Derham Hall

Joe Drennan
Sports Editor

Cretin-Derham Hall just wants a conference to call home, but nine metro-area conferences have turned them down.

The Minnesota State High School League has stepped in and recommended that Cretin-Derham Hall be placed in the Suburban East Conference, one of the conferences that initially turned them down.

Cretin-Derham Hall has been competing as an independent team this year after it was asked to leave the St. Paul Conference. Prior to being asked to leave, Cretin-Derham Hall competed in the St. Paul Conference for 26 years.

Both the SEC participating schools, and Cretin-Derham Hall do not agree with the placement.

"The criteria for placement of a school in a conference is geography and enrollment," Forest Lake High School athletic director Joel Olson said. "Neither of which are compatible of the schools in the SEC."

Since Cretin-Derham Hall doesn't comply with the criteria used for placement of a school in their conference, SEC athletic directors chose to appeal the MSHSL's placement of Cretin-Derham Hall into the SEC.

"They didn't meet the criteria, and the committee who over saw this did not follow that criteria," Olson said. "There is a better fit for them."

Cretin-Derham Hall's 2003-04 enrollment for grades 10-12 is 985 compared to Hastings' 1,380, the SEC's smallest school. Stillwater, the largest SEC school has an enrollment of 2,235. In terms of geography, Cretin-Derham Hall is located in St. Paul, and truly is not close to any of the SEC schools.

In a released statement, Cretin-Derham Hall athletic director John Janke said, "Cretin-Derham Hall has decided to appeal the decision of the MSHSL placement committee which recommended Cretin-Derham Hall be placed in the SEC. After meeting with officials of the SEC, and our own careful consideration of the situation, Cretin-Derham Hall has determined it is in the best interest of our student athletes and our programs to contest the placement. We have sent written notification to the state high school league of our intent."

Part of the reason Cretin-Derham Hall was asked to leave the St. Paul Conference after 26 years was because of the dominance in sports, mostly football and baseball.

Forest Lake High School football coach Jim Herman said, "They are a good program, but there are a lot of good programs in the conference. The biggest problem with adding them in football is that it would give us nine teams in the conference and you wouldn't be able to play everyone in the conference."

This scheduling conflict would also force all SEC teams to scramble to find a non-conference opponent in the middle of the season when most teams are playing their conference schedules because of the odd number of teams in the conference.

"If we had somebody else to make ten in the conference then we wouldn't at least have to scramble for non-conference games in the middle of the season," Herman said.

The addition of Cretin-Derham Hall also brought up the question of what schools are supposed to do about games they have scheduled with a non-conference team.

"What happens to teams that have a two-year contract like us with Menomonie," Herman said. "Would we have to break that contract?"

Apart from the initial scheduling conflict, Forest Lake Baseball coach Brian Raabe sees the travel to Cretin-Derham Hall as an issue as he said it just didn't make sense for Cretin-Derham Hall or any of the SEC schools to have to travel like that.

Neither Raabe or Herman are against Cretin-Derham Hall joining the SEC because they are knowing for their dominating programs.

"When people say they're good competing, yea, they are," Herman said. "But when you play them instead of Hastings, Mounds Vie or Stillwater, it's not the big of a deal. There are a lot of good programs in the SEC."

Raabe felt the same way, saying, "As a coach I love playing good competition. It would be great to have a school like Cretin-Derham Hall in our conference."

Herman added that it would be a bigger adjustment for Cretin-Derham Hall to join the SEC and compete against several quality programs week in and week out than it would be for SEC teams to get used to playing another good team.

"We already have a good conference and I think it would be fun to have them in our conference to get ready for section," Raabe added. "We set games up with teams like that [Cretin-Derham Hall to set kids up for a good high school career as well as a playoff run."

The idea of Cretin-Derham Hall being a superior athletic program is just that, an idea. Coach Herman agreed saying, "No teams in our conference don't want them in the conference because they're a good program. We're all quality programs."

Now that both Cretin-Derham Hall and the SEC have appealed the MSHSL's decision, they have to wait for their appeals to go to the MSHSL. With winter sports state tournaments already beginning, it could be April before Cretin-Derham Hall and the SEC find out what is going to happen.

"They could stay," Olson said. "If that's the case we'll work with them and we'll have a good relationship."
Herman agreed saying, "If they're on our schedule we'll play them."

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