Vanlue ousted from BVC football ranks

VANLUE – The numbers were never in Vanlue's favor. Possibly never more so than Friday morning. "I don't like it, I'm not a fan of it, but it was bound to happen at some point, I guess," Vanlue football coach Jeremy Kloepfer said Friday after it had been announced that the Blanchard Valley Conference Governing Board had voted to dismiss Vanlue from the BVC for football only beginning with the 2023-24 school year. According to Ohio High School Athletic Association numbers, compiled in late Oct., 2021 to determine divisional rankings for post-season tournament bracketing, Vanlue, at that time, had 24 boys in the 9th, 10th and 11th grades, the three classes used by the OHSAA to determine enrollment. "There was always the possibility. I mean, every year people would ask, 'How many kids are you guys going to have?' and we'd say, 'Well, we have this many,' and we'd go from there," Kloepfer said. "Every season, every week, other teams were worried if we were going to have enough (players) or not. And every year we continued to put 11 on the field and play the game." While Vanlue has never failed to field a team in 11-man football, the number of players in uniform has at times been right at the number or even below. "We started with 11," Kloepfer said of the 2022 season. "We had a couple of kids move in; we had another come out for football. We had 14, but one of the kids that moved in was academically ineligible, and another wasn't cleared (to play) until about Week 6. That put us at 12. Then we lost JR (Snook), who I think is the most talented athlete in the BVC. For a program like ours to lose a player like him, that was major." Vanlue did finish one game – a 38-36 loss to Ridgedale – with only 10 players on the field. "He was in there most of the second half," Kloepfer said of the injured player. "He only went out the last few minutes of the game." With athletic directors planning schedules one, two, three years in advance, the uncertainty of Vanlue's ability to field a team, had to be a concern, especially in the sport of football. At many schools, revenue generated during the football season underwrites several other sports and activities. With Vanlue now out of the BVC loop and facing a season as an independent – at least in football – Kloepfer, a former athletic director at the school, is well aware of the consequences. "It makes sense for us economically (playing in the BVC), not only for our school but our fan base," he said. "One thing that worries me is whether we're 0-10 or 1-9 or whatever, football still brings in enough money to pay for our spring sports. In the BVC, we don't charge admission for spring sports. You're allowed to, but nobody has done it yet. "We can drive, what 15, 20 minutes to watch our kids participate in sports. Now with football it's going to be maybe two, two-and-a-half hour drives and who's going to do that, maybe just the parents? If we lose that extra revenue from football, who's to say our spring sports won't be effected, too. You never know what the domino effect might be." Vanlue fielded its first football team in 1924, and went 5-2-2 a year later. Like many small schools across the area, Vanlue had its share of ups and own over the years, going 7-2-0 in 1946, 6-1-1 with a Little Eight League championship in 1955, and 8-0-0 in 1956. Consolidation merged several small schools into bigger, more competitive ones, though, and since helping form the Blanchard Valley Conference as a charter member in 1965, Vanlue has struggled along as one of the smallest football-playing schools in Ohio, with 10 winless seasons over the past 26 years. Kloepfer said dropping to the 8-man version of the game some small schools have adopted was never an option. "It's been talked about for years, but our kids and our parents have always said, nope, it's 11-man (football) as long as we can." As a player, coach and administrator, Kloepfer knew Friday's announcement was always a heartbeat away. "Back in '73, the year I was born, we had 13 players on the team. Here it is, almost 50 years later and we still have the same number," Kloepfer said of the state of Vanlue athletics. "They're always worried about the numbers. I understand that. What's bad for us is the numbers in our schools have dropped tremendously. With open enrollment we've lost quite a few kids. "That's kind of the way it goes. This was not really a surprise, but I wish it wouldn't have happened. It is what it is. You can't do much about it when you've got just one vote." Friday's decision by the BVC Governing board continues a changing landscape in the league that has seen Leipsic move to the Northwest Conference, Cory-Rawson and North Baltimore announce they are leaving for the Northwest Central Conference next season, Elmwood joining the BVC in 2023-24 and Liberty-Benton leaving the league by 2025-26.