There should be two state championships awarded in high school volleyball in KY

Before I get started, let me first congratulate the Whitley County Lady Colonels volleyball team on an outstanding two-year run in 2022 and 2023. A combined 60 wins, back-to-back 50th District championship titles, back-to-back 13th Region championship titles and back-to-back appearances in the Elite Eight of the Kentucky High School Athletic Association state championship tournament.

Incredible.

Truly, Head Coach David Halcomb and his crew should be elated at everything that this program has accomplished over the last 24 months. The players should be extremely proud of their efforts, and the Colonel community should give themselves a big pat on the back as well for the job that they’ve done in supporting this team.

Now, with all of that being said, it would be great if the KHSAA would re-evaluate allowing public and private schools to compete against each other at the state level in this sport in particular, because I think that I speak for a lot of folks when I say it gets tiresome seeing the same programs dominate the tournament year-in and year-out.

For those who aren’t aware, there has never been a volleyball state champion from a public school system. That’s right, I said NEVER.

Heck, on only three occasions has a team from a public school even made it to the state championship game. That would be Greenwood (Warren Co.) in 2011, Henry Clay (Fayette Co.) in 2016 and Paul Laurence Dunbar (Fayette Co.) in 2022.

That’s it!

In the last twenty years, here’s your list of volleyball state champions:

• Assumption (def. Mercy)

• Assumption (def. St. Henry)

• Assumption (def. St. Henry)

• Assumption (def. Notre Dame)

• Mercy (def. Sacred Heart)

• Mercy (def. Sacred Heart)

• Assumption (def. Mercy)

• Assumption (def. Greenwood)

• Assumption (def. Mercy)

• Assumption (def. Notre Dame)

• Mercy (def. Notre Dame)

• Assumption (def. Owensboro Catholic)

• Sacred Heart (def. Henry Clay)

• Assumption (def. Mercy)

• Assumption (def. Mercy)

• Assumption (def. Mercy)

• Notre Dame (def. Mercy)

• St. Henry (def. Mercy)

• Notre Dame (def. Dunbar)

• Assumption (def. Notre Dame)

I mean, it’s pretty clear that these private schools have a huge advantage in this particular sport. For that reason, why can’t they compete amongst themselves for a state title each year, and let the public schools battle it out on what would be a much more even playing field?

I understand that it’s really easy for me to sit at my keyboard and type those words, and that there are plenty of considerations here, but I would love for someone to explain to me exactly why this can’t happen. Why wouldn’t it be a better alternative to what we have now, which is absolute domination by a small group of private schools? It gets kind of demoralizing after a while, doesn’t it?

Sure it does. So, let’s look at changing it.

I admit that I don’t have a complete understanding of all the differences between public and private schools specifically as it pertains to athletics, but based on conversations that I have had recently, it sounds like there are several. Again, if someone would like to lay all of these out for me so that my understanding can be complete, that’d be great, but for now I will simply let that ridiculously lopsided list that I provided above speak for itself.