There are bad ideas, and then there are really bad ideas. And, the idea of the college football playoffs expanding from four to eight teams, is well, a very bad idea.

From left to right, above: Outstanding Offensive Player St. Paul’s Jack Mashburn was effective passing and rushing

Mount Carmel’s Ellie Holzman, the Outstanding Player of the Division I state volleyball tournament, was one of five Cubs to sign college scholarships last week when she chose the University of Illinois. Also signing were 

When the head coach has won almost 600 games and 26 state championships, to say that any single win in program history might be one of the best ever is, well, a lot. But, the score and the domination was hard to ignore.

The city’s longest running boys’ basketball tournament appears to be heading for a new renaissance. It was evident by the large crowd in the Jesuit gym on Dec. 1 that watched the Allstate Sugar Bowl CYO Basketball Classic’s championship game that there is renewed interest in the early-season games.

Did he live up to his moniker? When LSU cornerback Greedy Williams declared for the NFL draft, he also said he would skip LSU’s Fiesta Bowl game against Central Florida.

The 2018 high school football season is officially over for local Catholic schools.  It ended last Friday when Archbishop Rummel, De La Salle and St. Charles Catholic were eliminated in the Select divisions’ semifinal round.  So, we move indoors just in time for the first of many arctic blasts to come. It’s now basketball season.

If your purple-and-gold eye balls still feel like they are about to pop out over LSU’s seven-overtime loss at Texas A&M, that’s understandable. Still replaying it, over and over, one week later? I get it.

St. Paul’s will have its task of repeating as champion of the Allstate Sugar Bowl CYO Basketball Tournament cut out when it joins a lineup of 12 teams for opening night on Nov. 27. The Wolves, winners of two of the last three CYO championships, will begin pursuit  of the classic’s 65th title when they meet Newman at Holy Cross in a 7:30 p.m. Pool D game on Nov. 28, the second day of the classic.  

Ellie Holzman’s departure from the local high school volleyball scene will be a bitter-sweet occasion. Bitter for Mount Carmel, whose side of the net she has ruled since her sophomore season in 2016, and sweet for every opponent on the Cubs’ 2019 schedule.

It is a smash hire by the University of Kansas football team. Getting one Leslie Miles to coach the Jayhawks football team gives the school instant credibility and instant exposure. The networks can trot out all the video of the former LSU coach eating grass and denying his interest in the Michigan job.

If Mount Carmel Academy doled out state championship rings, its senior volleyball players who were in the program since the eighth grade, would have to wear the next one on their thumbs.

After the first Friday night of the state football playoffs, I did a deep exhale. Thank goodness the top seed in Class 2A, the Many Tigers, had advanced to the second round. The Tigers struggled to win, 76-0.

It is a case of Louisiana fatalism at its best, and it didn’t even take four quarters of football against Alabama for it to rear its ugly head, again. Will LSU ever beat Alabama again with Nick Saban as head coach?

Winning a state volleyball championship never gets old to Mount Carmel head coach April Hagadone. Her Cubs have won five between 2010-2017. Striving to coach the best program in her school’s division, Rebekka Bonnaffee wants to secure a first title for Archbishop Hannan.

As Nos. 8 and 9 seeds, Jesuit and St. Paul’s were set to face each other on the field of battle on Saturday (Nov. 10) at 6 p.m. for the second time this season. The two “select” schools, who met in Week 2 of the regular season, were playing a Division I first-round game at Tad Gormley Stadium for the chance to take on No. 1 seed, John Curtis, the following week.

Welcome to one of the biggest Sundays in recent Saints’ regular-season history. The Saints, unbeaten at home in the playoffs in the Sean Payton era, have a chance to be the No. 1 seed in the NFC with a win over the unbeaten (8-0) Los Angeles Rams.

I expect all hands to be on deck on Nov. 7, the date that schools of the Louisiana High School Athletic Association below Class 5A declare their intentions to remain in their respective classes or to “play up.”

Dominican’s Kelsey Major (18:58), left, and Brother Martin’s Scott Appleton (15:43), right, won the two divisions of the District 9-5A cross country meet at the City Park course on Oct. 25.

Mount Carmel, winner of five of the last six Division I championships, shares the No. 1 seed with Archbishop Hannan, the top-ranked school in Division IV, as the race for an Allstate Sugar Bowl state volleyball championship gets under way. The two powers are among 12 local Catholic schools to qualify in one of four divisions for the Nov. 8-10 matches at the Pontchartrain Center. Archbishop Chapelle drew the No. 2 seed as result of its successful regular season in which the Chipmunks finished second to Mount Carmel in district play. Dominican is the Division I No. 16 seed, but Mount Carmel’s top threats are No. 3 Dutchtown and No. 4 St. Joseph’s Academy of Baton Rouge.