Schwiker, Gannison Krizak Rundio proudly sponsors to Friday Night Drive. I'm Mike Krazak.
If you've been injured, we are ready to take on the insurance company
and get you to the end zone. We've recovered hundreds of millions of dollars
for our clients. Visit ga nassi n dot com. What's up everyone,
and welcome back to the Friday Night Drive Podcast. I am Kyle Neighbors along
with Steve Susy. Here it is Monday afternoon at for recording that we're dropping
this on Tuesday morning, December six, and we're recording this episode in advance
of the ISSA with the anticipated reveal of where we will be at for the
next several years. Here for IHSA State Finals. The matchups in are the
last contract between where we were flipping between Northern Illinois University and the University of
Illinois. Those have expired. They've been in the bid process. We finally
here coming this week. The just A board meets on Wednesday, December seventh.
I'm guessing by late Wednesday afternoon at the very latest, by Thursday morning,
December eight, I assume we're going to have an idea and I know
where we will be out for the next couple of years, Sus. But
before we dive into that kind of an overview here we you know, Friday
Night Drive, everyone kind of took a deep breath. I was talking about
it on Twitter, and we took a kind of a deep breath after the
State finals. It's it's fourteen game weeks for us here at Friday Night Drive,
but it's about seventeen weeks when you look at all of our preview content
at a mad dash to the finish line. And so we kind of slowed
down this past week. But now that we're starting to settle back in,
we want to keep these podcasts going and have some topics to talk to you
about, Sus. And you know, I think it was maybe the night
the Saturday night after the eight A game or ended, or the next morning.
You were kind of half joking and mostly serious. So you were already
asking for twenty twenty three schedules. So you are, as I said,
we were already in the kind of the planning process for twenty twenty three.
Right. Well, you know it's funny that I mean, yeah, I
was asking for him, but I have a feeling that if I hadn't asked
for him, I was gonna start getting them anyway. I mean, that's
usually what ends up happening. The season wasn't even over yet, and I
was getting people inquiring if I knew who was available in such and such a
week for a game. So, um, you know, I never I
never want to stop talking about it. So I enjoy those questions and queries
more so than anything else. Um. But you know, the process,
it's always kind of moving along, even though you like you said, you
know, you take a breath there shortly, but um, people are are
in the motion. The wheels are in motion for talking into the next season.
You know who's you know, I was already getting questions about, you
know, who are going to be the big guys next year. You know,
who are the big underclassmen that are coming back in the in the you
know class of twenty four. Um, you know, And I'm not quite
ready to discuss that at great Land at this point because I'm still kind of
siphoning through a lot of things while wrapping up this season. But it's still,
you know, it's always there's always something kind of percolating under the surface,
whether it be you know, conference realignments or teams looking for games,
or you know, situations where you start talking about, well, who's got
the most underclassmen coming back for next year. It's the conversation, while sometimes
it's kind of a low whisper, almost never stops entirely. Yeah, it's
it's it never it never comes to a complete halt. And that's kind of
the basis for a lot of what we'll be doing on these podcasts over the
offseason. A lot of the content you see at Friday Night Drive dot com.
Uh, you know, already up there today Michael dwell Jack had a
CCL SCC notebook looking at NAZ Loyola, Mount Carmel, Providence teams that played
in the state title game. You mentioned realignment. Will be diving in in
the future about the realignment coming with the cc L and e SEC. We
got some new conferences that are forming, some teams moving conferences. A lot
of stuff we'll talk about in the future. US content coming this week obviously,
we'll have a lot of stuff about what's happening with state football and where
that's gonna take place. You know, we're just give people an idea,
Like we got a deep dive Michael's been working on for several months about the
state of officiating and the lack of officials and what the ihsa AN organization are
trying to do outside the box ideas to try and get some new people in
on that. A lot to talk about, but for the most part,
today we're gonna we're gonna talk about state football. But before we do,
there was one nugget that sus and I were kind of discussing an off air
before we started recording, and it was about the schedules he was looking through,
and it was, you know, Saint Teresa, and I didn't even
realize that, Susy, you told me this, and I didn't know that
Saint Teresa no longer a part of their conference going to an independent schedule,
and a Week five matchup was one that stuck out stood out to you with
Winslow or the one that you immediately went to. But it sound like there
were several games on that schedule that already kind of peaked your interest. You
know, when you look at at what's left in the Group of Independence in
the state of Illinois, I mean, there aren't many, and you know,
when you see a team move from an established conference to the ranks of
the Independence. You start to wonder about how they're going to be able to
put together a schedule in that situation, and some really intriguing things happened with
that. I mean, obviously, the Northwest up State a LINEI conference is
one with an odd number of teams in it, so they're going to need
to fill one of their non conference dates with a team from possibly the Independent
ranks or something like that, and that creates some weird off weeks for teams.
And that's why Lena Winslow was available for a game in week five.
And if you don't know a lot about the way scheduling works, almost no
one's open in week five. I mean, so typically what teams have to
do if they draw one of those middle of the season off weeks, they
usually have to find an out of state opponent to fill that date. But
in this situation, Decatur Saint Theresa, a newly created Independent in this situation,
doesn't have a lot of relationships that they've already had to fall back on
in scheduling. It makes for a really really interesting fit with Lena Winslow coming
down to Decatur Saint Theresa in week five. You know, for a Saturday
afternoon game. That can be completely honest with you, I might be making
a trip to Decatur if the schedule holds up the way that I had that
I want to so I would finally get a chance to see both of those
teams in a regular season. Yeah, that's that's actually my follow up collection
for you. There was that game is I was that game on Saturday because
I assumed, because of the distance between those two schools, they wouldn't want
to make that drive on a Friday night. And then I was secretly hoping,
you're based down in Kankakee County, getting down Decatur's easier. I'm up
here in mckenry County getting too, Lena, it's easier. So I was
secretly hoping you were going to tell me the game was that Lena selfishly myself,
But uh, you know, that's a much easier drive for you,
So I guess you'll have to be the one to give us a report from
that game. Yeah, it's it's just it's it's a really interesting thing to
look at when you look at it in a hole. I mean, they
also Saint Theresa also has a game with Solono Unity. They're closing the season
in a Week nine game with a five A power Highland, which I thought
was a pretty big bite for Saint Theresa to try to take. But once
again you go back to how many independents are left. Um, you know,
the inability and the difficulty in finding games and opponents willing to play.
So Saint Theresa really not backing down from anyone that is willing to sign on
the dotted line. So respect to them, because getting themselves in a good
playoff position with that schedule next year and an attempt to defend their Class two
A site state title will be challenging, all right. So the like I
said, the main, the main thrust today is it going to be talking
about state football and make sure you stick to Friday Night Drive dot com will
have full coverage coverage for you over there. You can follow us on Twitter
at f and Drive. You can follow myself on Twitter at Kyle Neighbors.
You can follow SEUs on Twitter at the SEUs. You can also find Friday
Night Drive on Facebook and Instagram. Just search for Friday Night Drive. Follow
us on there everyone, you know, it helps more people find us when
they when you get to follow and all those algorithms start working. It helps
us grow, which we do this for you. It's a high school football
community that we are trying to build, so we appreciate everyone that follows along.
And the other thing I want to say about that and then we're gonna
get into it is, you know, we want to know what people discuss
or want us to discuss. It's it's not always easy coming up with topics
and things to talk about, particularly during the off season. So never hesitate,
you know, particularly like just jump into my DMS or SEUs you say,
hey, this is something I think you guys should discuss, or you
know, I can't promise you that we're going to get to it if it's
something weird, which I sometimes get some weird one from people, but you
know, I always appreciate ideas, So don't ever have to take to reach
out right south. Yeah, and on that topic, I kind of picked
a Twitter fight last week just to kind of see what people were talking about.
I'm not ducking the public versus private debate. I do plan in the
off season to take a deep dive into this and truly kind of try to
get an idea of what you know from both sides of the argument, what
the expectation is, what the hope is. I've got some of my own
personal thoughts on this topic that I will eventually share, but I just wanted
to kind of get a feel of what people were talking about on this topic.
I know it's a very contentious topic on a lot of levels. What
I'm more interested in is, and I'm not trying to say that I'm a
policy maker here, but I'm more interested in knowing what would get us closer
to where we're not constantly at each other's throats on this topic, because you
know, I think what we're doing right now isn't the ideal solution. I
don't think the ideal solution is separation. I really don't, and I don't
think a lot of people ultimately want that. And it was kind of why
I invoked the whole how many states do you think are really doing this?
Because that was what that was what I was trying to get at. It's
not common, and there's a reason that it's not common. And there's also
a reason why some other states have done this and gone back after doing it
because they didn't like the feel of it. So be careful what you wish
for and some of these situations because it will get but I do intend to
dive in in the off season here and really take a deep grind look at
it and talk about what what might might might make that argument a little bit
more, uh, you know, stomachable to the people that are really charged
up about this topic. Yeah, I mean this is this is certainly a
topic. It's a good tea suits. I'm glad you brought it up.
This is a topic that we're going to hit on several times that Friday night
Drive over the course of the off season, whether that's you know, kind
of long form pieces trying to break down the data and look at it.
I was talking about and I'm not sure it would be next week's podcast,
but one of these podcasts here pretty soon. I've got several people, and
I'm sure you're gonna have more. I haven't even brought this up to you
yet, but I want to try and talk to some coaches that I know
that have coached or that work have worked on both sides of it, both
in the public and the private, and see how comfortable they would be in
terms of kind of bringing people behind the curtain a little bit more. Because
it's it's it's a lot more nuance, and people think like they just want
to scream recruiting and listen, I get it, like there are things that
are happening that shouldn't be happening, like we do need to improve the system,
but it's it's not as simple, like these Catholic schools aren't just walking
into some gym and taking kids out of there. Like. It's a lot
more nuance on than that. There's problems on the public side too, So
my goal here is to try and get some of the people that actually have
experience with this on a daily basis and get them come in and talk to
them about it. So we'll see how that unfolds. Hopefully we're gonna have
that podcast for you and the relatively near future, so stay tuned for that.
Now, as we turn over here, I want to We're already about
twelve minutes in sus so I'm gonna go ahead. We're gonna take a quick
commercial break at a word for our sponsor for the Friday Night Drive podcast,
and then we'll come back and finally dive into the topic that was the genesis
of this episode. So stick with us. We'll be right back. Schweiker
Gannison Krizak Rundio proudly sponsors to Friday Night Drive. I'm Mike Krizak. If
you've been injured, we are ready to take on the insurance company and get
you to the end zone. We've recovered hundreds of millions of dollars for our
clients. Visit GA nassi n dot com. All right, thank you once
again to sgk our Love for joining us here as the sponsor for Friday Night
Drive dot com. And now, as I said, the reason we were
here was to talk about state football in the future of state football that weekend.
Sus you and I are on the same page. We wrote about it
in our column. We really enjoy the overall feel for what happens in Champagne.
Really. I talked to many many people down there over the two days,
and it was pretty common a thing that pretty much everyone enjoys the setup
in Champagne. The one drawback I heard, and I completely agree with it,
is the only actual drawback is the size of the stadium, which is
odd because it's such a gorgeous stadium since they redid it. I like being
down on a field on Saturday. It was just great to be down there
it's a good place to watch a game. The one problem with it being
that large, though, is on game day, particularly in the smaller classes,
it can feel a bit hollow and dead. It can, but you
know it for me, it's like, I mean, I don't really know
what the solution is per se to that particular issue because I mean this,
I want to preface this by saying I am not sliding small school football when
I say this, It's just a mathematical situation. Right. If the entire
two towns sounds closed down for the one A final and bring every people,
every person that lives in that town to any of the potential venues, it's
still not going to be very full. Like that's just the reality of the
situation. Um, you know, and I don't. I don't think there's
any real solution for that. And so I mean it does play better,
like like you can tell a difference in terms of like the crowd noise between
northern and when it's there and you And I'm not saying and listen before people
think like I'm trying to say like this is what you should bait your decision
on. That's not what I'm saying. Like that is pretty low down or
pretty far down the list of things. But what I'm trying to say is
that you have I is such a good facility and it has served it so
well. That is really like the only thing. Yeah, I would say
it was a common complaint, right. No, No, that's the one.
That's that's where it comes from. And that's like, you know,
my preference of the sites available is Champagne. Um. It based based on
you know, what I know of those those facilities. Now, to be
fair, I have not been in Illinois State since the renovation, so that
is clouding my judgment a little bit in regards to that. But and I
kept coming back to what I had heard from a couple of people over the
course of discussing this with them. You know, for me, I think
the best athlete experience is provided by you. Of I I think that if
you ask them where do you want to play in the state final, I
think the answer is going to overwhelmingly be Champagne. I just think, you
know, the cash a of playing on a big ten field, you know.
And I was struck back by something, and you know, because I'm
a weirdo, I went back and watched all of the eight finals again on
television after I got home, so because I can't quite let it go.
And there was something that one of the broadcasters had said about the fact that,
you know, for a lot of these kids, it's the last time
that they're ever going to suit up the seniors. They may not be going
on and playing anywhere else beyond you know, high school, and for them
to have the opportunity to close their football careers on a big ten stadium field
has a cachet to it that none of the other sites can match. So
that for me, you know, I think that's kind of where why I
lean the way that I lean on it. I'm welcoming and open to other
solutions and other ideas there certainly are, but for me, it's like,
where do the guys that are actually doing this want to play? Yeah,
and I think it's Champagne I could. Yeah, I can definitely see that.
So let's let's kind of set it up here and give a little more
of an overview and zoom out for a second. So we were down at
State and and so the first thing I want to say is that we know
from talking to people for sure that at least two bids have been submitted we
know people actually, let me stop you there. I know there's been there
have been four schools that okay, so I so through my conversations, I
knew of two you have I. But what I heard from that was that
the bid that they submitted was staggered or every other year, right it is.
They were looking to make a three year commitment that was staggered. So
their bids submission was basically saying alternating for a three year period, you know,
alternating over the you know, a six year stint, basically finding a
similar situation to the northern situation right now where they would they would alternate those
bids. That is what my understanding of the u of I bid is.
That's different than what the IHSA had asked for in the bid process, and
that yes, which is a continuous five year arrangement. So for the University
of Illinois to be granted this bid, they would one have to find a
partner willing to abide by this, which I think they'd be able to do,
and two for the HSA to say, this isn't what we wanted,
but we're okay with that plan. It also, in my mind, makes
them a pretty substantial underdog in this process. But that's for that's another step
of the conversation here we'll get to in a minute. Yeah, so that's
where we are at UOV. Before we move on from you, of I
will say. The other thing that is intriguing about this process when it comes
to you of I is head coach Brett Bilma has made it publicly clear that
he wants the state finals back at uo I. They've had success so far.
Brett Bilma is coaching or I'm sorry, he's recruiting Illinois better than a
u of iye coach and his staff and their staff have recruited Illinois in a
long time, and he knows the power of having that at Champagne. So
it's a welcome it's it's it's a much more welcoming environment than previous regimes in
the Illinois coaching staff. Right. They understand the significance and the importance of
being able to do this to put in in roads not only for the current
teams but for future teams. Uh. They're they're doing a little bit more
now than they have done in the past. Um to UH to make to
make it more welcoming to the I just say, continuing this relationship with them.
So the fact that they are asking for kind of like a bid modification,
I think with this particular group they might be more willing to bend those
original specifications because of that. I mean, it's little things. It's like
the helmet display that they that they put up in the concourse. I don't
know if you saw that over the course of the weekend, where they they
mandated you they basically said, bring us an extra helmet because if you win
the state championship, we're going to put it in a display case that we're
going to keep all the way up until the next state finals in our building.
Like, it's little things like that where they're trying to create a union
with the IHSA, schools, its memberships, it's coaches as schools, it's
players that maybe has not been there before. And so that where we're kind
to add at you a v where you like, you look at it and
you say, well, that bid doesn't fit the specifications that the HSA wanted,
but there are things that make that keep you a vie in the Roman
possibilities and the other thing as we go into this discussion that I want I
want to frame it as irritating is not the right word, but maybe aggravating.
It's an okay one because the fact that the IHSA is not a public
body, it's a private body, Like they don't have to reveal what these
bids look like. Um, so I wish and I guess I hope once
we do get a site set and I don't expect this, but I kind
of hope. I know people from the h S they do listen to this,
so maybe, uh maybe I can kind of push them along here,
but like just some level of transparency about why, like what the bids were,
why they chose what they did, Like that'd be nice, um,
because I do think that these these universities are making substantial pushes to try and
come up with a good package. Um. And one of them, as
the other one you said you have four, The second one that I knew
of was I s U makes a lot of sense centrally es centrally located down
in Bloomington, updated facilities, newly renovated that you know, uh downsides.
I don't really see a lot of downside, but uh what I mean?
So, what are the other two that you heard of? SEUs Northern and
the and in my opinion, the real long shot been in this one.
Southern has Southern Illinois University has also put in a bit for the finals.
Yeah, that's I can't imagine that would happen. Yeah, I just think
it's it's too far, and especially when we get into a situation, which
I do think will happen. It may not be next year, but I
think eventually we're going to get to a one to thirty two bracket where history
has proven and shown that the majority of the teams that would qualify for the
state final would probably be being asked to make four to five hour trips to
the finals. And I don't think that's an ideal. I mean, I
think while it's not required and decal, especially as has had some people making
some long trips up to them, I think centrally located is probably an ideal
for what they are trying to do here. So it wouldn't surprise me,
like I said it would be. I think SIUs are really a real long
shot. I appreciate that they have good facilities, you know, and would
like the opportunity to showcase them. I just think some of the intangible issues
there are are not going away, and I think it would be kind of
a hard Sell. I hope I don't. I'm not stealing a column idea
or a column that Michael O'Brien was going to write. A Michael O'Brien,
of course, the excellent prep editor with the Chicago Sometimes I was sitting next
to him at State Football suits who are on the other side of me,
So you certainly were in these conversations with Mike as well. But you know,
he talked about it would kind of be cool, you know, even
if it was like if they wanted to do something in southern to try and
give people down there the opportunity to host that and for people that maybe don't
like to travel up it is close enough to the Saint Louis metro area that
you could potentially draw some decent crowd because of it. I do kind of
like the idea of, like, if you wanted to do that with that
kind of concept in mind, if you said, okay once every five years,
every fifth year, will do that, if you like you were able
to find a few different sides. The problem with that though, is like
the more site you have, the more complicated to get the logistics about.
I'm moving them around. But I like, I understand, like the concept
of what Mike was saying. I do think that would be a cool idea
on the surface. I just don't know if logistically it would ever make sense.
Yeah, it's definitely one of those things where it would be like,
you know, I've kind of danced around in the past that with you know,
it might be interesting to do split sites, you know, we have
I think eventually we're going to get into a situation in the state where we
may have nine classes when eight man finally reaches it's it's or we might end
up going an eight man class and reduce our you know, the eleven man
football to seven classes. I don't know, but I think, you know,
I think sometimes maybe a split site might help, especially like if you
took five through eight A because if you look at if you look at who
makes the five through eight A finals, it tends to be schools closer to
Chicago Land. So maybe that would help if you did have a venue closer
to Chicago Land for the five through eight finals, and then you know,
maybe the one through four A finals is a rotation of Central and Southern Illinois
sites. Um, that's that's that. I don't know if that's something that
they'd be willing to explore. But I think it's an interesting idea that we've
never really gotten into. And I don't know if they necessarily want to do
that either. I think there are a lot of There are a lot of
pluses um to having you know, championship weekend all at the same place where
you get if you're if you're a high school football fan, you know,
just a fan who just wants to go watch football, no matter who the
teams are involved. Um. The way that they do it now is very
appealing. UM. But I think there are there's some merit to at least
thinking about the potential of maybe splitting it. Yeah, I want to.
I want to get into some of those outside the box ideas. That was
certainly one. I got a couple more I want to talk about before we
do. I do want to we hit on the three of the four we
just mentioned. Northern. Um. Obviously, we have experience with going to
Northern. And I'll say this, like talking to coaches and players, they
actually everyone I talk to really likes the on field experience at Northern. They
like the setup there. It's it's it's it is convenient in terms of you
have you know where you're able to get bust into. It's the The indoor
practice facility is right there next to the stadium and you literally walk through a
set of doors, walk down a short hallway. The setup there is really
good. It's more the logistical stuff for everything else that isn't as great.
The media. And see, this is where I have to be a little
because I'm it's I'm one. I'm it's painful for me to say it as
an niu alum uh. You know, I try and be nice to my
alma mater. But the press box up there is I mean, it was
built in the sixties. It hasn't been updated. They've been trying back in
like twenty twelve. They have this twenty twenty plan and that they had where
there was this big renovation plan they were gonna, I think, knock down
that entire of the stadium rebuild a modern press box. They you know,
couldn't come up to financing like that. Nothing's never been done. It continues
to be very outdated over there. And I don't want to just look at
it from a press perspective, but I think you see that just out past
that because like there's not a lot of room like you go on ule By,
there's a ton of room for the coaches like upstairs that want to call
game from up there, to have their staffs up there. That's a big
thing. We literally when we're at NIU, the different people, the different
coaches, we can hear them screaming during the game. That's that's how small
the press box is. So if not just a media thing, I know
the coaches want more room up up top like that as well. Yeah,
it's I mean, like I said, a lot of times, this discussion
from people outside of the press falls on deaf ears and it's like, oh
boo hoo. You know, you have to you have to be a little
inconvenienced by your surroundings. Um. It's just one of those things when you
know, I just look at the logistics of it. Uh, you know,
I just I don't know. I don't feel the same down there with
the experience. And I'm glad to hear that the players, you know,
are having a good on field experience there. It something just misses a little
bit with me and the Northern experience. UM. And it's some of it
is the press box, some of it is just it just doesn't feel like
the energy feels a little bit off to me. I don't know, especially
on Friday. Um it's maybe a little bit better on Saturday, but um
it suffers from the same in some ways. It suffers in the same way
that I think that Southern does. Like it's for you know, a school
down you know, a little bit south of Bloomington. If I'm if I'm
not directly connected to that team, I'm not making that trip like that,
that's that's too far. Like it's just that's the logistics of it are not
great, so minority of the teams that end up qualifying there. But I
still, you know, I keep hammering on the same point. I think
central location is important to many of the people involved in the selection of this
process. Well, and this is where we're probably really never going to know.
Um, I mean, I maybe there'll be more transparent than I'm expecting.
But so you look at it and I think I made this comment,
like what is the percentage the population percentage that lives north of I eighty,
So like if we talk about want to be centrally located to convenience the teams
from the south, but like one of the biggest money makers for the IHSA
and like they need to take a revenue There was a like they were hurting
coming out of the pandemic because the loss of the postseason that year, like
the h State Finals, is a big revenue maker for the organization and if
they don't make that, those costs are going to be passed on to schools
or taket increase ticket price and increases. So they may not publicly say it,
but like there has to be a consideration of, well, yeah,
you have I or I sue were centrally located, but if we are up
north at NIU, do we see a significant revenue increase from that? So
and I don't know what their numbers are, like, um, I don't
publicly, they don't they They've never released like actual attendance figures, and I
don't think that process is going to start anytime soon. But I'm sure they
have data on decub now, so that will be a that will be a
contributing factor. And maybe I'm a way off base, Maybe it is maybe
the numbers are significantly better to where that gives them a leg up in this
conversation. I don't know the answer to that. It's so and it's eyeball
speculation on my part, I don't think the crowds are significantly stronger at DECAL.
Don't. But I could be told that they are, and I would
nod my head and go, Okay, I guess you're right. I mean
that I don't have the data. So and this is where this is a
good place to end it for the last let's say five or ten minutes,
and we'll wrap this up, because this is where I think it's a good
conversation to have the out the kind of the outside the box ideas. You
already mentioned the one about a potential eventually, and I don't so I think
everything we're about to discuss here, all these ideas are not things I expect
to see this time. I expect to see a five year contract and then
I expect after that they might start to look at different ideas and try and
get a little more creative. Right now, I feel like they're just trying
to get steady coming out of the pandemic, just have something they can rely
on. So you mentioned like if they talk about revenue and they look at
it, maybe they do want to do a split site down the road where
they say, all right, the five through eight eight classes, the clear
majority of teams are coming from there. Let's get those up there where we
can get the most fans, the most people that are willing to come by
doing that and then having the lower classes down in the center of the state
or maybe once a year every five like down in Southern that's one thing,
right, And before I go through an idea, I have I mentioned a
couple in my column, anything else on that you wanted to hit on,
you know, the one thing and obviously this can't happen now, But the
one thing that I've the one idea that I had heard floated and proffered,
and I don't even know if they're interested in, but the would be a
potential rotation between Northwestern and the University of Illinois once they get there get their
field finished. Yeah, I think that would be a fascinating blend of kind
of the best of both worlds type of a situation. But like I said,
I don't even know if Northwestern would be interested in something like that.
If they, if they were, then yeah, because I mean, that's
that's going to be a major renovation project that they're undertaking. It fills the
bill of being you know, relatively close to typical qualifiers and the larger classifications.
But you know, like I said, don't even know if they are
interested. But that's one of those things that I think down the line would
be a fascinating sort of situation to be withheld, and it also would meet
the needs and requirements of both of those universities. So for me, that
was just an interesting balloon that someone floated and I thought, well, it
just kind of raised my eyebrow a little bit when I heard it. But
obviously can't be done now. I mean we're not even there yet, so
right, Yeah, like I said, all I think all these topics we're
looking at after the next five year term, I do think that's a really
a really interesting idea. I love what I've seen of the renderings of Northwestern
potential new stadium. I'm not sure, like has that been is that just
like are they greenlit on that? Do they have them the finance and in
place? I haven't looked, I guess closely enough. As far as I
know it's happening, it's a goo okay, So yeah, I mean,
yeah, that would be interesting. And two ideas I threw out in my
column that I wrote after the state finals, do you still find that at
Friday Night Drive dot Com. These are two outside the box ideas. If
the Bears were two leaves old your field, which I'm I'm pretty confident at
this point, it's you know that they are going to Arlington Heights. Were
they projected to close the deal in Arlington Heights after the first of the year.
We're now what we're in December, So if things haven't fallen apart yet,
I assume that the Bears are going to be moving forward with that.
I assume that they're gonna that they are going to break around on that new
stadium. And I'm not saying, you know, I'm sure it'd be awesome
to have a State at an indoor new facility out at Arlington Heights, I
know, like Michigan does Theirs at a Ford Field in Detroit. But outside
of that, if the city of Chicago lost the revenue of having the Bears
that Soldier Field eight games, that Soldier Field once a year, people would
be excited, right. I do think it would draw good crowd being in
the city. Now people coming outside the city, which would be a lot
of people. A lot of teams might complain about the traffic and hotel prices,
and that's something you certainly have to consider because it is Thanksgiving weekend.
So um, that is that one major knock against that, but something I
would think that the city of Chicago would at least have interest in. And
the other one I mentioned in my column was Toyota Park, which is the
soccer stadium that has been used of Fenwick was at Fenwick and Oak Park Forest.
Yeah, they played a regular season game there this year. Um,
it's a really nice facility. There's a couple of brand new hotels that have
an indoor facility right there. Um, I'm not sure if the field itself
meets the specifications currently, Like you know, I think it was good for
that one game. I'm not sure how it would work for an entire weekend,
but it is. It's near the city, but it's far enough to
the west that you don't have to deal with quite the amount of traffic.
It's near two major interstates in fifty five and two ninety four. There's a
lot of places that there's a lot of things that makes sense about that site
logistically from from a big picture perspective, I don't know when you got down
to brass tacks if it would work though, Yeah, you know, it's
one of those things where I don't know if it would work. And right
now it's like we have solutions on the table for the short term that I
think are what they are. It's the short term. It's I mean,
the landscape could totally change at the end of this term in regards to what
may be available and what the options could be. So we're talking a lot
of hypotheticals down the line, but I think in the current in the current
structure, the options available to the Illinois High School Association for awarding this bid,
you know, I all along I've said I think the favorite label is
on Illinois State. I think it's a newly renovated venue. It's been there
before, and I mean obviously it wasn't renovated there. It's it's got the
right stadium size to make it seem like, you know, it's that that
state atmosphere. It's got a brand new field to it. It has you
know, the connected you know, the connected facilities that you need to make
that thing go. You know, I think it's a little under fifteen thousand
and seeding capacity, So I don't think you're ever going to get into a
situation where you're going to have sellout situations, but you're going to have some
substantial crowds for some of those games to make it feel give that kind of
environment. So I think that maybe kind of what they're going to to kind
of meet that complaint about the University of Illinois kind of feeling like a you
know, an empty cave for some of those games. But you know,
that's that's kind of where I'm at. I wouldn't be surprised if they went
in another direction. Like I said, I don't have all the data.
I don't have all the information in front of me, you know, if
you haven't figured it out. I'm a data guy, so I like to
kind of have that thing before I go into kind of conclude. But I'm
really kind of getting a vibe from talking to some people not involved in the
decision making process but close enough to it where I think they I feel like
they have a pretty good pulse of what may go into the decision making process
that I think Illinois State is your favorite here. It would not also surprise
me if it came back with a modification to continue to include the University of
Illinois. Either I don't know what that would look like, but it wouldn't
stun me either. I felt like there were a lot of really positive vibes
in Champagne and I think and they shouldn't be related to one another, but
in some ways they are. Basketball last spring was extremely positive as well.
Like I was there, I was there the entire time everybody. Just to
be clear, if someone, if anyone listening, you have, I hosted
the same basketball tournament last year, I believe for the first I'm in comedy
a lot. Yeah, early renovations. Yeah, so yeah, you know,
it just it kind of feels like and some of this goes back to
the conversation we're having earlier in this podcast about coach Bielema and the vibe that
they've kind of created down there. I don't know if the I say really
wants to fully cut them out of this, you know, And I think
this is a good place, a good place to end it on, because,
Yeah, one of the major decisions, and one thing that we can't
predict, only the people in the decision making process are is when they're going
through these discussion with the different universities and you talk about the positive vibe and
the thing that you have, I have done to kind of improve improve the
relationship is. Yeah, there is a lot of logistical things that go on
behind the scenes between the I say, and a host site. So if
they've I if they develop a working relationship with you will vie where they're like,
this is really good, like this is easy isn't the right word,
but things run smoothly the host, the host facility is responsive and taking care
of issues. Maybe they're willing to make adjustments for something like that. Yeah,
and look, we don't know the answer to that, but it's no
you know, for me, it's like when we look at what ultimately is
going to get decided, it could go one of you know, obviously four
ways, but I think realistically it's probably gonna go one of three ways.
But you know, in all of those situations, they at least some people,
some people have knowledge of how it went when it was at issue.
Obviously it's going to be different now. But um, you know, I'm
a dinosaur. So I actually have seen state finals at I SUM and I'm
expecting a different experience than what I had when I went to IU, just
based on the improvements that have been made there. So you know, I'm
hoping that we have a similar type of opportunity like we did when they may
change its state baskeketball, where we have the opportunity to ask some questions of
the process. Because there was a press conference after the basketball announcement, I'm
hoping they have another one of those. I sort of expect that they will,
so that maybe we'll get a few answers to some of these questions.
But it should be very very interesting to see how it all ferrets out,
and you know, if there's a modification, if there isn't, in which
way this goes all right, Well, we should know the answer to the
questions we've been answering or asking on this podcast within just a couple of days
here, So stick with Friday Night Drive dot Com. We got full coverage
for you. We'll have the news story as soon as it break, suits
will have some analysis on it. A lot more coming at Friday Night Drive
dot Com this week. We just started the nomination process for our Friday Night
Drive Team of the Year, which will drop right after Christmas. That's another
thing. You can shoot me a DM you got a player. If you're
a coach listening this, you got a player you think deserves to be dominated
for Team of the Year. Shoot me a message with staff. We'll get
him on that nomination forum for you. Those are available until December fifteenth.
That's when we're going to close that out and get that team selected. But
right now we're going to go ahead and sign off. Thank you again.
Ended up going a lot longer than I planned to, but once we get
talking football, that tends to happen. So thank you everyone who's stuck with
us. We hope you enjoy the show. We'll be back next week with
another episode. We're gonna sign off. Make sure once again you stick to
Friday Night Drive dot com. For Steve Susie, I am Kyle Neighbors.
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