A football lays on the field in view of the end zone at a high school.
The Border Classic all-star football game between top high school players from Ohio and Michigan didn’t last long.
Following its second loss, Ohio officials acted quickly to end the series after only two games.
“It wasn’t our doing, it was their doing,” said Clawson coach Jim Sparks, the Michigan High School Football Coaches Association’s chairperson for the game. “We played them and, literally, the Tuesday after the game, we got a call from them saying they would no longer continue the association with the game.”
Ohio officials told Sparks that it had nothing to do with the two losses: 27-14 in 2014 in Findlay, Ohio, and 24-7 in 2015 at Wayne State in Detroit.
“They claimed money and things like that, but we were able to manage,” Sparks said. “The ironic thing is when they approached us, Pennsylvania had backed out of the Big 33 (game), and Pennsylvania had told Ohio it was because of money. Ohio told us it was because they had beaten them so many times; Pennsylvania left because of that.”
Without an opponent from a different state, the MHSFCA will return to an East-West format for its 34th annual game, June 25, a week after the state finals in baseball, softball and girls soccer.
This year’s game will be played at Saginaw Valley State, and the MHSFCA has tweaked the selection process.
“Instead of having a certain amount of players from Class A, B, C and D schools,” Sparks said, “we require one player chosen from every one of our coaching association’s 18 regions. And each team has to have one eight-man player, as well.”
The change was made to create statewide representation and interest.
“If you were in Region 3 by Alpena, in our old format, you could go 10 years between having a player in our game,” Sparks said. “At least now everybody in that region knows it will have a player in the all-star game.”
Sparks thoroughly enjoyed the two games against the Ohio team, but the return to the East-West format will give twice as many Michigan kids an opportunity to play.
“It changes the mission of the game, that’s all,” he said. “For the East-West game, it’s more to just promote the game of high school football and to give kids an opportunity to play a game on a big stage. Not everyone can play in a state final, but you can play in an all-star game that feels like a state final.”
Check out the full rosters and coaches here.
Contact Mick McCabe: 313-223-4744 or mmccabe@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @mickmccabe1. Brian Manzullo contributed.