I can think of no state high school athletic association that has only one division in sports anymore.

The most common rationale is more athletes in smaller schools are given the opportunity to compete against schools their enrollment size at the state championships.

But I believe many states have gone too far with the number of divisions they have incorporated in their sports programs.

In team sports, I do not feel that any school that has a losing record should qualify for post-season competitions. They didn’t earn such an honor and often get blown away in the first game.

When it comes to individual sports, I can only speak of scholastic wrestling. I was the West Virginia Secondary School Activities Commission rules interpreter, clinician and supervisor of state officials for wrestling for 28 years.

During my tenure in that position, I witnessed numerous wrestlers qualifying for the state tournament with losing records who were usually pinned during the first round of the competition.

Again, it concerns me that someone with a losing record in any individual or team sport should earn the right to qualify and compete in state tournaments.

Furthermore, a number of West Virginia wrestling coaches were pushing for eight all-state wrestler awards instead of six. With 16-man brackets, that would mean that half the wrestlers would be designated as all-staters.

Wisely, the WVSSAC administration felt that the additional placements were a bit too much and rejected the idea.

The Days of True State Championships

My brother wrestled in the late 1950s while I competed in the early 1960s when Pennsylvania had only one division. There were approximately 600 scholastic wrestling programs across the commonwealth at the time.

The post-season format included: Sectionals, districts, regionals and states. Note: If a wrestler lost at any level, he was finished.

In other words, there were no wrestle-backs for place winners other than the champion and runner-up at each post-season competition.

It was like being second in a gunfight.

Only the champions of the post-season regional tournaments in each weight class qualified for the state tournament.

The matches were close from the start of the competition, and I can assure you there were very few pins.

Just ask Dan Doyle, OVAC wrestling commissioner, a product of that era in West Virginia.

The days when West Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania had only one division in athletics, such true state championships were microcosms of real-world experiences. There are very few second chances in life. We learned to accept our losses (failures) and benefited from them.

Likewise, poor sportsmanship was virtually nonexistent. Remember, we were raised by parents of the Greatest Generation who taught us that making excuses or blaming others was unacceptable.

At this point, allow me to share one unique athletic feat with area sports enthusiasts. When there was only one division for Ohio high school wrestling in 1959, wrestlers from the village of Bridgeport won the OHSAA state wrestling championship.

Being a community with fewer than 2,000 residents, they out-distanced high schools from Cleveland, a major Ohio city with a population of more than 900,000 people.

At the helm of Bridgeport’s wrestling team was Ohio Valley’s multi-sport coaching legend and OVAC Hall of Fame charter member, George Kovalick.

On the 1959 team was future two-time Olympian Bobby Douglas. Douglas, who also is a charter member of the OVAC Hall of Fame as an athlete, was a sophomore and won states at the 112-pound weight class.

The Bridgeport Bulldogs are the only Upper Ohio Valley wrestling team to win a true Ohio State Championship.

What an amazing athletic accomplishment.

In closing, perhaps we have now gone too far in seeing to it that every athlete be recognized and rewarded no matter the record.

Food for thought.

(Welker, a Warwood resident, is a retired educator who has 40 years of experience as a K-12 classroom teacher in public and private schools. He also has more than 60 years experience as a successful wrestler, coach and official.)