Northville NXN team barred ability to go to NXN nationals by MHSAA rule after qualifying in regionals

So an individual from a school can go because they don't represent that school, but a group of five or more individuals that race after the state association's season and without school uniforms, without the school's coach, without any school resources (transportation, money for entry fees, lodging, etc.) and race under a club name is somehow representing that school?!?!

Clear as mud!

Run the race and let the archaic association explain it better in court!

Best of Luck Ladies!

To me the issue is that MHSAA says no HS National Championships. A lot would have to change for people not to consider NXN a HS National Championship, basically it would have to not be what it is.

If all else fails see if Nike will allow the team to go as 7 "individuals"

Problem solved. Crisis adverted.

Ron99 wrote:

An organization should be allowed to run as it sees fit. If you do not agree with certain rules, you have the options to either petition the decision makers to vote to change the rules or you can decide not to be part of the organization.

Except when that organization is a monopoly.

Having some experience with these matters, my advice is to not include your school in these discussions with the State HSAA. The school admin, and especially the AD, will not be prone to rock the boat. They will kiss up to the HSAA as it is a monopoly. If the school admins cause any issues, go to the school board. (I assume you elect them).

My experience is that the HSAA will lose in the court of public opinion, as well as in actual court.

You may want to also very publicly point out the fact that last year they allowed Grant Fisher to travel to CA for a XC meet- but when it comes to allowing the girls to travel this year, they threaten them. The public will view this as sexist, and won't worry about the nuanced differences. Btw- a quick look at their website shows the directors are named Thomas, John, Adam and Mark. All the secretarial/admin assistant jobs appear to be female names. See how that works in the court of public opinion?

Nike has a bigger stick than you- I hope that they use it.

I think that this is such an over-reach that they are putting their entire organization at risk of being overseen by the courts until they can prove capable of running it for the benefit of the student athletes, both male and female.

My prediction is they change course in about 24-48 hours.

Here is MHSAA take on it

http://www.mhsaa.com/news/blog-from-the-director/articletype/articleview/articleid/4316/respecting-rules

"You may want to also very publicly point out the fact that last year they allowed Grant Fisher to travel to CA for a XC meet"

No, GF qualified and went - period. As have many other individual MI male and female athletes in the past. Precedent has been set both individually (unattached or club association) and club team wise.

Your problem was you got both your school and MHSAA involved.

Northville NXN team, you qualified - JUST GO. MHSAA's cross country season is over. They can try, through their written rules to control a MI athlete through an entire year; however, they could never enforce that in the court of public opinion and law.

MI club teams run New Balance Indoor National relay events, and New Balance Outdoor National relay events all the time as do individuals.

MHSAA may like you to think they have jurisdiction over the indoor season - - but they don't. Just like they don't have jurisdiction over the outdoor season once HS season is over. Just like they don't have jurisdiction over cross country season once HS season is over.

MHSAA will threaten, then go silent, let you get mad/vacillate/hypothesize etc. and hope that enough time will lapse so you don't go and all is swept under the rug.

The female discrimination angle that was posted pisses me off but unfortunately the poster is correct as that is an avenue that seems to be very effective in getting ones way in the USA. So use that angle and any other implied discrimination angle if necessary. But do so after you go and race, have fun, experience a big event etc. In the end you may not have to even go down that road.

Unfortunately, Northville is going to violate several of those six elements.

a. The event is not called or promoted as a national high school championship;

NXN calls itself the national high school championship.

b. Qualification is not based on performances in the high school season or MHSAA tournament results;

Qualification for NXN is partially based on performances in the high school season. At-large spots are determined by head-to-head matchups during the high school season.

c. The event is open to all non-school teams or individuals who qualify directly through one or more non-school events, or the event is without qualifying standards and is open to any individual who pays the entry fee;

NXN fails this prong as well, non-school teams cannot qualify directly. Only teams of individuals from the same school, and therefor "school teams" can qualify for NXN.

d. If a team event, teams are not to be made up of students from a single MHSAA member school;

Northville violates this, although could get around it by adding an 8th member from a different school and not running them. NXN allowing that would also then reach compliance with prong c, although there would be a strong case that adding a non-running alternate does not put them in compliance.

e. Teams and individuals do not represent an MHSAA member school;

NXN is not in compliance here either. By only allowing teams to be made up of individuals from the same school, the teams represent an MHSAA member school. Whether they call themselves something else or wear blank uniforms, they still represent their school if no one else is permitted to run on the team.

and

f. No MHSAA member school uniforms, transportation, funds or coaches are involved.

NXN is in compliance here, with a wink and a nudge.

You can wiggle around several sections of that rule, but you cannot avoid "a". NXN explicitly calls itself the national championship for high school XC. There's no way around that. The rule is ridiculous and pathetic in purpose, but Northville will clearly violate it six ways from Sunday if they go to NXN.

I would add that individuals should be barred under that rule as well. That's selective enforcement if they permit individuals and not teams.

One thing NXN requires is a form from each kid signed by the individuals state high school athletic association as well as their school athletic director to be able to participate. If MHSAA will not sign off Nike will most likely not allow them to participate.

So how can the MHSAA allow individuals to run Foot Locker or NXN? Doesn't that still violate prong a.?!?!? How about the relay teams running indoor NATIONALS?

The MHSAA seems to be drawing from the standpoint that competition beyond what the MHSAA provides compromises the academic success of the athletes. Do any other states have rules for any sport that follow this logic?

Do we need to call Obama?

I agree, MHSAA should be barring individuals from FL and NXN. It's very, very clear in the rule. Either change the rule or enforce the rule. I laugh that their blog post explaining their position is called "Respecting Rules".

They do state this before listing those points.

"A decade ago, Michigan school districts added the following language to permit participation in national scope tournaments by individuals and groups of young people who had no connection to or similarity with a school team on which they had participated during the school season. The full and complete rule states:..."

But yeah FL is HS

If it were me - I'd just go and not say anything. Corey was decent with us when we couldn't run the Portage Invite because of a religious holiday that nobody on the team was a member of. I organized a bus, uniforms and ran under a club banner. MHSAA was supportive. They are also turning a blind eye when NBIN is during the outdoor season. Seriously, go and fight them over the winter.

School ADs are the biggest wimps I have ever seen as a group - unwilling to advocate for the athletes! That is the only job they have in my book!

Really hope the girls go to NXN!

What a shame that MHSAA is applying their 'rules' in such an ad hoc manner. That MHSAA Jack Roberts should be so embarrassed. Of course he will not blog why MI runners at FL and NB races are not violating "prong a". Doing so would require internal consistency, of which he has none. Makes his "Respecting Rules" blog posting just a JOKE.

Girls should go to NXN on their own accord. It's still (marginally) a free country. Get on the plane and run! The school can't get sanctioned because they can claim they support the MHSAA. So, worst case scenario is that the 7 girls can't run in MHSAA events anymore - but so what? First, it would be worth the experience, and second, they can still train together and run (as a club) at other invitationals and road races outside the MHSAA domain.

"For nearly a full century, the high schools of Michigan have stood in opposition to national high school athletic championships. As they existed in the early years of school sports, and even today, such events have very often exploited students and benefitted commercial sponsors most. Such events are beyond the limited resources of most local schools; and allowing one school to participate tends to require other schools to go to the same extremes to remain competitive, creating the kind of arms war in school sports that now drives college sports further and further from their academic mission."

So they are worried about students being exploited and commercial sponsors benefitting most? The kids don't need to pay for anything at NXN. They all seem to have a great time and Nike's bottom line is not significantly affected.

Seems the MHSAA is exploiting these young girls to me.

Exploit: use (a situation or person) in an unfair or selfish way.

The girls cannot just go and run. Nike requires approval from the state for each team for it to be able to run, and it's quite clear these girls would not be able to get approval from MHSAA.

I agree with your first point though. If he's going to be defending his rules, he should at least give a logical explanation for why certain people were able to break the rules, however these girls are not allowed to.

I would actually really like to know his reasoning. What does he have against teams that he doesn't hold against individuals? It makes no sense.

There are couple unrelated issues here:

First, Milesplit and others do the girls no favors when they say that "Northville High School" has qualified. It's a separate entity, NXC, that qualified.

Second, there IS a pretty clear violation of the MHSAA's rules. It's probably really article d. that causes the problems, if all the girls competing for NXC attended Northville HS. I don't see any interpretational wiggle-room. I do NOT believe that NXN promotes itself as a national high school championship, despite the fact that it calls itself a national high school championship, because the MHSAA rule defines the term in its rule. You can compete at NXN qualifiers even if you didn't win your state title; it's not a qualification requirement. You can't define a term in your rule and then use a "common sense" understanding of that term in your application of it. The "same-school" clause, however, seems on its face to be pretty problematic.

Third, the rule is outdated and anomalous, given the permission of 49 HSAAs for club teams to compete in this meet. The rule ought to change, and persuasive arguments should be made to the MHSAA that it ought to change. I don't know exactly what kind of appeal would have persuasive impact. I'm not a lawyer, but I do find it disconcerting that the MHSAA purports to have jurisdiction over what clubs girls decide to form or not form in high school, and what they can do in these clubs. A more reasonable - and potentially legal - rule would simply regulate what the member schools can and can't do (school uniforms, transportation, coaching, etc). I don't know if a legal case can be made, but perhaps someone with more expertise can weigh in.

Fourth, for the time being it doesn't really matter whether the rule is a good one, or even what the rule is or what the logical, plain-text interpretation of the rule might be, because an MHSAA official already ruled on this issue. By granting permission in 2013, with no subsequent rule modifications, the association offered its own interpretation of the rule, which permitted schools to attend and compete. They should be allowed to go because they already granted permission to go. Revocation of that permission without cause is at least capricious, and perhaps malicious.

With regard to my third point, the issue of consistency might have some persuasive appeal to the MHSAA. Their "Respecting Rules" post might be countered with a "Respecting Your Word" argument.

Nike could create the "MI exception." They could say that "qualified clubs without signed school approvals, can still run the race but not be officially scored for team purposes." So they would essentially run as individuals, but still get to experience the event and race against the other best teams.

Of course, the team could see where they finished in the "unofficial score".