Executive Director Message
The month of December means that Ohio High School Basketball is in full swing as teams begin their journey for the 2024 – 2025 season. I hope that you have taken the time to make sure that you and each member of your staff have joined The Ohio High School Basketball Coaches. All of our OHSBCA awards require five consecutive years of membership as a qualification to receive the award.

This year will also be the first year that we will have seven divisions in both girls’ and boys’ basketball. That means that the OHSAA made a significant change in how we will play the state semi-finals and the state finals. The girls’ state semi-finals will be played the weekend of March 7 – 9 with the boys’ state semi-finals on the weekend of March 14 – 16 at various locations throughout the state and the girls’ state finals will be played on Friday, March 14 and Saturday, March 15 with the boys’ state finals on Friday, March 21 and Saturday, March 22. The OHSBCA and the OHSAA will plan to meet shortly after the conclusion of the state tournaments to evaluate how this new schedule worked for this season.

We will again be using the Max Preps RPI for the seeding of our tournaments this year. The OHSBCA District Directors made some adjustments by changing the percentages to 40% WP (Winning Percentage) – 40% OWP (Opponents Winning Percentage) – 20% OOWP (Opponent’s Opponent Winning Percentage). A second component of points of classification was added for each division, and a third component for out-of-state opponents was also added. You are reminded that the RPI will only be used for
seeding purposes it will not determine teams’ placement on the tournament bracket. You are also reminded to report all your scores to Max Preps. The initial Max Preps RPI will be released the week of January 6th.

The OHSBCA will also be hosting our initial Shoot Clock Shootout at the Canton Fieldhouse on December 27, 28, and 29. There will be a total of 15 games on these three dates with five girls’ games and ten boys’ games being played over these three days. We hope that this event will provide our association and the OHSAA with data to study on the possibility of implementing the shot clock for future use in Ohio.

And finally I would just like to remind you of the important role that you can play in the development of young athletes. The commitment to standards, the development of goals, and the ability to learn how to handle adversity are just a few of the many life lessons that your players can learn through playing basketball. Here is a story I would like to share from my high school coach, Ron Stevens, after we lost a tough game with one of my very best teams in the tournament. He shared a story where he told me to  remember to “keep my fork.” At first I didn’t know what he meant but he said to remember as a kid when you were sitting at the dinner table and your mom told you to “keep your fork.” That usually meant that there was something special coming like a special dessert. So, as a coach remember to “keep your fork” because with hard work, discipline, and grit there will be special things that will happen for you and your team.

Wishing each of you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year and best of luck this season.

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OHSBCA To Sponsor Shot Clock Shootout
History will be made on December 27th-29th, 2024, as the Ohio High School Basketball Coaches Association (OHSBCA) sponsors the first-ever high school event using the shot clock. This event will take place at the Canton Memorial Field House, featuring fifteen games over a three-day period.

OHSBCA Executive Director, Joe Balogh, stated, “THE OHSBCA is excited to sponsor the 2024 Shot Clock Shootout. This exclusive event  will feature 15 games all  utilizing the shot clock  under the guidelines of the National Federation of High Schools. Data and information will be gathered from this event to continue discussions surrounding the future implementation of the shot clock in the state of Ohio.”

Over the past few months, the OHSBCA has worked with the Ohio High School Athletic Association (OHSAA) to get approval for this event. “Upon a request from the OHSBCA, the OHSAA has approved the use of the shot clock for an exclusive three day event at the Canton Memorial Field House,” stated OHSAA Commissioner, Doug Ute. “We are excited about seeing how the shot clock works during this event with the possibility of expanding the event to various locations next year.”

The games will be played at the historic Canton Memorial Field House in Canton, Ohio. Joe Bogdan, Director of Sports, Athletic Partnerships, Facilities, and Physical Education for the Canton City School District stated, “Canton McKinley High School is excited to partner with the OHSBCA on this event. The OHSBCA’s commitment to running first class events and their willingness to help make this a fan friendly event on pricing really sets them apart from other large scale showcases. Canton Memorial Field House is the best high school basketball venue anywhere. Having the Shot Clock Shootout here is the perfect combination of basketball’s past and future.” Tickets will go on sale December 1st. You can stay all day on one ticket, but you will be unable to leave and return. Ticket prices are as follows:
Student...$5.00
Pre-Sale Adults...$7.00
All Tickets at the Door...$10.00

“This event is a pivotal moment in Ohio High School basketball, offering our student-athletes and coaches a unique opportunity to be a part of history,” stated Adam Hall, Public Relations Director for the OHSBCA. “We’re hopeful that this event will drive continued conversations about implementing the shot clock in high school basketball statewide. The anticipation for this event is incredible, and we can’t wait to see the talent on display.”

For more information about the 2024 OHSBCA Shot Clock Shootout, please contact Adam Hall at ohsbcapublicrelations@gmail.com or Joe Bogdan at bogdan_j@ccsdistrict.org.

Friday, December 27. 2024
12:00 PM - Martins Ferry vs Indian Valley (Boys)
1:45 PM - Streetsboro vs Akron Ellet (Girls)
3:30 PM - Maysville vs Carrollton (Boys)
5:15 PM - Worthington Christian vs Moon Area (Boys)
7:00 PM - South Point vs Norton (Boys)

Saturday, December 28. 2024
12:00 PM - New Lexington vs Meadowbrook (Girls)
1:45 PM - Hiland vs Laurel (Girls)
3:30 PM - Olmsted Falls vs Pepper Pike Orange (Boys)
5:15 PM - Elyria vs Cardinal Mooney (Boys)
7:00 PM - Gilmour Academy vs Canton McKinley (Boys)

Sunday, December 29. 2024
12:00 PM - Moon Area vs Streetsboro (Boys)
1:45 PM - St. Ignatius vs Canton McKinley (Boys)
3:30 PM - Richmond Heights vs Gilmour Academy (Girls)
5:15 PM - Olentangy vs Stow Munroe Falls (Girls)
7:00 PM - Lakewood vs Stow Munroe Falls (Boys).

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President's Message
Congratulations to the 2024 State Champions. What an outstanding achievement! The Girls winners were Div. I - Olmsted Falls, Div. II - Cincinnati Purcell Marian, Div. III - Columbus Africentric, and Div. IV - Fort Loramie. The Boys winners were Div. I - Cleveland St. Ignatius, Div. II - Kettering Archbishop Alter, Div. III - Cleveland Heights Lutheran East, and Div. IV - Richmond Heights. Additionally, congratulations to the head coaches of these teams on winning a state championship.

It was great to see the outstanding support these student-athletes received from their communities throughout. boys and girls championship weekends. A thank you to The University of Dayton and the staff for being hospitable hosts, the arena had a great atmosphere for student-athletes to compete in during both weekends.

Prior to the Boys State Tournament, we held our annual meetings to select our post-season awards, scholarships and academic awards on Thursday, March 21st at The University of Dayton Arena. Thanks to all the Directors across the state of Ohio for taking time to meet to select various award winners from the OHSBCA.

We would like to especially congratulate 2024 Paul Walker Award winner Andy Booth from Wadsworth High School for being named the recipient of this prestigious award. Andy has made major contributions over the years coaching kids, mentoring of coaches,
and to the OHSBCA.

On Friday, April 26th the OHSBCA North-South All-Star games were held at Olentangy Liberty High School. Special thanks to Girls North-South Director Adam Priefer and Boys North-South Director Greg Nossaman. The following evening, Saturday, April 27^th we honored the 2024 hall of fame class which included: Gregg Collins of Lexington / Mansfield Senior, Pam Davis of Archbishop Hoban, Doug Hale of
Oak Hill, Carl Kremer of Archbishop Moeller and Dennis Schrock of Chippewa. I would like to specifically thank Paul Wayne who chaired the great event. “Wayno” has done a wonderful job with the great evening for many years. What an outstanding weekend for our association and basketball in the state of Ohio!

As I begin my third and final year as President of the OHSBCA, I’m excited to see what this year brings. Two additions to the 2024-2025 Ohio High School Basketball season should bring a new level of excitement to basketball in Ohio. First, the OHSAA adding three classifications, going from 4 to 7 Divisions, in the 2024-2025 high school basketball tournament. Secondly, the OHSBCA hosting a basketball event that will utilize the shot clock. The OHSBCA Shot Clock Shootout at The Canton Memorial Fieldhouse December 27^th - 29^th will be the first basketball games to utilize a shot clock during a high school basketball game in Ohio High School Basketball history.

Finally, I want to encourage all Ohio basketball coaches to promote the skills that will stay with the student-athlete after high school. Post-secondary skills like working with others, problem solving, composure during adversity, being early to practice/games/meetings etc... Good luck and good health during the 2024-2025 season.

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OHSBCA Coaches Clinic
2024 OHSBCA Clinic will be returning to the clinic format of Sunday/Monday and the downtown Columbus location for this year’s clinic. The clinic will be held on Sunday, September 22, 2024 and Monday, September 23, 2024 at Batelle Hall in the Greater Columbus Convention Center.

The 2024 Clinic will use the Sonesta Columbus Downtown Hotel as the Clinic Headquarters. It has over 400 rooms, so all coaches who desire to attend the clinic will be able to be housed at the clinic site. In addition, the downtown Arena District is located within walking distance of the Sonesta Hotel, giving clinic attendees ample entertainment opportunities.

Batelle Hall will be set-up with a basketball court to allow for sessions “on the court.” The line-up of speakers is below with their topics.

We hope moving back to the original format and location will allow our coaches to have an enjoyable weekend with their staff. This clinic is a great way to get ready for the upcoming season and catch up with friends from around the state! So, make plans now to attend the 2024 OHSBCA Coaches Clinic!

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North-South Game Coaches Announced
Greg Nossaman, Boys North-South Game Director, and Adam Priefer, Girls North-South Game Director, announced the North-South Game Coaches. To be a nominee to coach in the North-South Game, a coach must be an OHSBCA member, must be nominated by a District Director, and coached in the 2023 District Finals.

The Coaches are Roger Jury of Hopewell-Loudon, Chris Hassinger of Medina, Anthony Calo of Olentangy Orange, Nathan Copas of North Adams, Steve Suter of Hopewell-Loudon, Jordan Eaton of Olmsted Falls, Corey Small of South Gallia, and Klarke Ransome of Marysville.

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Paul Walker Award Goes to Andrew Booth
The Ohio High School Basketball Coaches Association is proud to announce that Andrew Booth of Wadsworth High School is the recipient of the 2024 Paul Walker Award. The Paul Walker Award is presented annually by the OHSBCA to an active coaching member of the association who has made significant contributions to high school basketball. The award is named in honor of the late Paul Walker, the longtime coach of Middletown High School. At the time of his retirement, he had the most wins as a boys’ basketball coach in Ohio High School Basketball history.

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OHSBCA Announces Hall of Fame Inductees 2024
The Ohio High School Basketball Coaches Association (OHSBCA) is proud to announce the coaches and date for the Hall of Fame Class for 2024. This year, the association is inducting four coaches into the Hall of Fame. The five high school coaches being inducted are Gregg Collins of Lexington / Mansfield Senior, Pam Davis of Archbishop Hoban, Doug Hale of Oak Hill, Carl Kremer of Archbishop Moeller and Dennis Schrock of Chippewa.

The Induction Ceremony for the Thirty-Fifth Class will be at the Columbus Marriott University Area at 3100 Olentangy River Road in Columbus, Ohio on Saturday, April 27, 2024 at 5:30 PM. Tickets may be obtained by Calling Hall of Fame Director Paul Wayne at 419-261-2547 or by email at wayno14@embarqmail.com.  
 
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Executive Director Message - Joe Balogh
The excitement of the 2023 – 2024 season has begun with the girls tipping off Thanksgiving weekend and the boys starting on the first weekend in December.  One of the first things that fans have noticed in these early games is the change in team fouls initiated by the National Federation of High Schools. There are no longer any 1 and 1 foul shots in high school basketball. Teams will now shoot free throws on the 5th foul of each quarter and the fouls will reset to zero at the start of each quarter.  It will be interesting to see how this affects the coaching strategies at the end of each quarter.  

Also, we would like to remind all coaches to make sure you report your scores to Max Preps. We will be using the Max Preps RPI rating system for tournament seeding this season. As a reminder the RPI will only be for seeding it will not determine teams’ placement on the tournament bracket. Coaches will still have the opportunity to place their team on the tournament bracket. The initial release of the Max Preps RPI will take place on Monday, January 8th on the OHSAA website.

On December 13th the OHSAA released a statement that their board of directors and staff are looking at the expansion of divisions in both girls’ and boys’ basketball. Our association has been in communication with OHSAA Executive Director Doug Ute on this process and will be providing input on the process of expansion. As announced in the news release their will be statewide meetings in January to discuss data and get feedback on the topic of expanding the number of divisions.  

Finally, just a reminder of the influence that you as a coach can have on the young men and women who are on your team. As a coach you have the primary responsibility to be a teacher.  A teacher in the area of providing the necessary instruction of skills for each player to better himself or herself individually and to successfully organize these players into a working team.  However, a coach is not only a teacher of the skills and concepts of basketball.  A coach must also be the teacher of the many values that a player can learn from participating in athletics.  Athletics is an area where the important values of sacrifice, teamwork, dedication to a goal, and self-discipline can be learned.  

Best of luck this season!
 
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OHSAA Basketball using MaxPreps for RPI Data Collection and Seedings
The Ohio High School Athletic Association has decided that Ratings Percentage Index is a more accurate way to seed teams for the OHSAA Tournament and it will be employed in basketball this winter. MaxPreps can calculate RPI based on strength of schedules and has offered to provide this service for the sport of basketball for the 2023-24 season. The intent of this new data collection is to employ a more equitable way to determine a team’s postseason seed. Below is the basic formula that will be used. 

The RPI formula is = (0.40 × WP) + (0.35 × OWP) + (0.25 × OOWP). 

• Winning percentage (WP): Divide the number of wins by the number of total games played. A tie is worth half a win. If a win in an individual contest gives that contest a winning percentage of 1.00, a tie would give that individual contest a winning percentage of .500 for both teams.

• Opponents’ winning percentage (OWP): Average the winning percentages of a team’s opponents. (Note: This is not calculated via the combined record of the opponents, instead by averaging each
winning percentage of the opponents.) All games involving the team whose RPI is being calculated are ignored in this process.

• Opponents’ opponents winning percentage (OOWP): The same process as described above, except calculated for the opponents of a team’s opponents. Note that there is an exception for out-of-state
teams, which is addressed below.

This is the RPI at its purest form which is based on wins, losses and strength of schedule with no filters (i.e. class size, etc.). Each game will count as 1 point (ties are worth 0.5 to each team for win and loss.). Out-of-state teams are weighted the same as in-state teams. Non-varsity and non-member schools (i.e. prep schools, Canadian schools, etc.) are not included in the RPI calculation. Further review of these parameters may be considered, but simplicity is the focus for this initial season.

The official OHSAA RPI standings will be published on OHSAA.org. It is worth noting that any RPI data published elsewhere is unofficial and should be viewed with skepticism as it may not be correct. The OHSAA RPI data should not be confused with the MaxPreps rankings. MaxPreps rankings are updated twice a week and posted on www.maxpreps.com.

The RPI standings will not be published for the first time until mid-January. This is to allow teams to have at least competed in a few games to have RPI data. Once they are posted, feeds are updated daily during the remaining regular season.

A major advantage to the RPI is the transparency that comes along with its accuracy. The components of the formula are known, and its results can be easily replicated.

Essentially, only one school needs to report the score into MaxPreps, but we recommend each school check scores daily to see which games are missing results. MaxPreps also can monitor accounts so school participation can be tracked for those not entering results. If this becomes required, it will be easy to identify schools not participating and the OHSAA may administer fines.

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President's Message
Congratulations to the 2023 State Champions. What an outstanding achievement! The Girls winners were: D1 Cincinnati Princeton, D2 Cincinnati Purcell Marian, D3 Columbus Africentric, and D4 Tri-Village. The Boys winners were: D1 Archbishop Hoban, D2 Akron Buchtel, D3 Lutheran East, and D4 Richmond Heights. The University of Dayton was a great atmosphere for student-athletes to compete in both weekends, and it was great to have fans back in the arena cheering on their teams across the state. Congratulations to all the coaches across the state for milestones this past season.

Prior to the Boys State Tournament, we held our annual meetings to select our post-season awards, scholarships and academic awards on Thursday, March 16th at The University of Dayton Arena. Thanks to all the Directors and Girls District Directors across the state of Ohio for taking time to meet to select various award winners from the OHSBCA. We would like to especially congratulate 2023 Paul Walker Award winner Dennis Tucci from Malvern High School being named the recipient of this prestigious award. Dennis has made major contributions over the years coaching kids, mentoring of coaches, and the OHSCBA.

On Friday, April 28th the OHSBCA North/South All-Star games were held at Olentangy Liberty High School. This year both the girls and boys North-South All-Star games were held in the same location - Olentangy Liberty High School. Special thanks to Girls North-South Director Adam Priefer and Boys North-South Director Greg Nossaman. The following evening, Saturday, April 29th we honored the 2023 Hall of Fame class which included: Marty Hill (Windham); Bob Krizancic (Mentor); Joe Staley (Chaminade-Julienne); Ed Zink (Beavercreek); The banquet was held at the Columbus Marriott Inn on Olentangy River Road. I would like to specifically thank Paul Wayne who chaired the great event. “Wayno” has done a wonderful job with the great evening for many years. What an outstanding weekend for our association and basketball in the state of Ohio!

As I begin my second year as your President, I’m excited to welcome two major changes to Ohio High School Basketball. First, the utilization of MaxPreps ratings system to seed teams for the OHSAA boys/girls basketball tournaments. This should ultimately enhance regular season scheduling and the tournament seeding process. Secondly, the NFHS rule change to allow two free throws on the fifth team foul in each quarter. This rule change should cut back on the amount of physical play while also introducing a new element of coaching strategy.

Finally, the first year in the role of OHSBCA President has been a blessing. As coaches we have the opportunity to develop special relationships while molding young men and women to be valuable contributors to our schools, families and communities. I hope for your decisions this season to be made with all student-athletes in mind.

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