As he passes the five-year mark as IHSAA commissioner, Paul Neidig reflects on the biggest changes in the Association during his tenure.
Five years ago, Paul Neidig began his tenure as Indiana High School Athletic Association commissioner in a world of uncertainty.
The COVID-19 pandemic was in full force. There had not been organized high school sports in four months. The historic IHSAA boys basketball state tournament was canceled halfway through, with no champions being crowned for the first time since the tournament started in 1910.
Despite the challenges and unknowns that lay ahead, Neidig and his team found a way. Every state tournament in 2020-21 went off without a delay, making Indiana the only state to do so.
That’s what Neidig reflected on most when talking about his first five years (and six days) as commissioner last week. He believes the efforts of everyone during that year should be commended.
“I think it’s something we should be proud of,” Neidig said. “I think people in Indiana realized how important it was for kids to still go to school. We didn’t shut things down other than that spring of 2020. We found a path back, and we found a way to play games. That was the start, and I think that went really well.”
As Neidig begins year six of his tenure overseeing Indiana’s high school governing body, he spent time covering a wide range of topics and issues facing the Association today. This is the first part of that conversation. The second part will come this Wednesday, August 13.
Analyzing the new IHSAA transfer rule
It has been the topic that has dominated the high school sports discussion in this state, for better or worse. What was long a rumor became reality June 1 when a one-time transfer rule was enacted.
The premise is simple: a student-athlete can transfer one time before the end of their junior year (six semesters) without needing a waiver from the IHSAA. For seniors, the rules are different ― more on that in a second.
Just two months in, Neidig has noticed a slight uptick in movement, but also noted it was too early to tell just how much impact the new rule has had.
“The number of transfers we processed this year over the same period of time is up almost 200 at this particular time over where it was at last year,” Neidig remarked. “But you have to keep in mind, we process over 3,000 transfers on an annual basis, and so some of that may be transfers coming in earlier now with the new rule. Until we really get through a year, anything I would say would be anecdotal at best.”
One area of concern for Neidig was the increase in “past link” transfers. Students transferring to follow a departing or an AAU coach is still subject to being ineligible for 30 days or more, depending on the case. In the past, Neidig mentioned there would be 3-8 past link cases a year.
This summer, there have already been 20.
“It appears families aren’t making an education-based decision, but making decisions to follow a coach somewhere,” Neidig said. “I think that could be problematic because, often times, these coaches are not educators.”
As far as senior transfers go, those athletes are only eligible to play immediately if they moved more than 50 miles away from their original school. If it’s within that radius, they have to sit out 30 days from the first competition date. That would be four football games and almost half the season of every other fall sport.
There is an appeal process to show if a true hardship took place, meaning the move was not athletically motivated. That process can take so long, though, that the 30-day sit-out period might be a shorter timeframe for athletes.
For now, the transfer rule is in wait-and-see mode for if any modifications will come of it.
“We constantly evaluate our rules,” Neidig said. “We’ll see what trends are, and if we need to make changes, we’ll certainly do that. But right now, we kind of need to see where this balances out and see where we end up at the end of the year.”
Numerous changes to IHSAA postseason formats
About half the sports the IHSAA oversees has had a change in the structure of its postseason tournament since Neidig took over.
The most notable one was flipping the regional and semi-state setups for boys and girls basketball, volleyball and baseball. Before, the regional would feature four schools in a three-game setup where teams would play semifinal contests in the morning, then return for the final at night. The semi-state would be a one-game championship a week later.
In 2022-23, that flipped. Now, it takes just one win to claim a regional championship, while a semi-state title requires two victories in the same day.
This has doubled the number of regional champions for those four sports, which Neidig views as a positive.
“I think it’s something we thought would help promote the sport, and in most of these cases, it has done exactly what we thought it would do,” Neidig said. “… With the tradition of Indiana tournaments, we’ve always had a two-game day in most of our tournaments. Moving that right before the state championship I think really brought double the number of schools involved, double the number of media eyes for local communities for the tournament.
“There’s been a lot more promotion, and we’ve seen good interest at the semi-state level with the new format.”
Other changes included soccer eliminating the two-games-in-one-day format of the regional, moving its regional semifinals to midweek and the finals on Saturday. Girls golf changed the qualifications for the state meet from 15 teams and 25 individuals to 18 teams and 18 individuals. Cross country eliminated the semi-state round, making the sectional and regionals a little more difficult for athletes to qualify for state.
“I’m not scared of change,” Neidig said. “I know change for the sake of change is probably not good, either. We study each time we make a change if we think it will be good for the sport, bring more interest into the sport and provide additional opportunities for the students.”
Addition of two new IHSAA sports ― and more coming
The last five years have been an expansive time for the IHSAA.
Three years ago, a change in qualifications for a sport becoming IHSAA recognized was changed. Instead of needing 150 of the schools participating, the number was lowered to 100. This cleared the path for girls wrestling and boys wrestling to go from “emerging” sports to fully recognized in two years.
Both sports had its first IHSAA state championship tournaments during the 2024-25 school year. Two others ― girls flag football and girls lacrosse ― are starting the emerging process this fall.
“What we believed would happen, happened,” Neidig said. “Once we gave some schools an opportunity to start participating under the IHSAA moniker, we’ve seen significant growth. It’s amazing both of those new sports grew to in excess of 100 schools within two short years.”
Including the two unified sports (track and flag football), the IHSAA oversees 26 sports. That number could reach 28 in two years, depending on the success of the two new emerging sports. That is a lot of oversight, but Neidig is confident his team can run everything effectively.
“I’ve been around long enough to where I can remember girls and boys soccer came on, and girls softball came on. A lot of the same conversations were happening then,” Neidig said. “Schools figured it out. We were able to recruit enough officials and train officials to give that opportunity. I really don’t look at this any differently.”
What is next for the IHSAA?
With how turbulent the sports world has been the last five years, it’s hard to predict what the next five will look like. Neidig notices youth sports being more sport-focused and college athletics turning into a professional-type league, which is why he hopes that high school sports can remain education-based.
“I do believe that people still believe in what we do,” Neidig said. “They still want to support education-based athletics where you still have to go to school, you have to be on track to graduate, you have to get your grades. … I think the most important thing we can do is sit here in five years and say we still have a great education-based athletic system that’s focused on the last kid who makes the team. The decisions we make in this organization have to be supportive of that kid just as much as the high-level athlete that gets the majority of the attention."
Austin Hough is a sports editor within the Center for Community Journalism at Gannett. Follow him on X (formerly Twitter) @AustinRHough. Hough can be emailed at [email protected].
This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Paul Neidig on IHSAA transfer rule, adding sports and what's next
Category: General Sports
