Taylor Garcia & Owen Berk
Student Sports Media
When people think about college sports, football comes to mind for many people. How far will these athletes go? Who is the best? With the new KJCCC rule as of 2016-2017, there is no limit with the number of out-of-state players you can have. In the past, the cap was 20. With that requirement being lifted, this can influence the recruitment of Kansas athletes.
A big reason for this change were eight teams in the conference threatened to leave if the rule was not passed. This included four football teams. The school that led the change was Garden City, followed by Dodge City, Independence and Coffeyville. The non-football playing schools were Barton, Cloud, Cowley and Seward.
2018-2019 football rosters show there are only 62 total Kansas members on all of the rosters across Kansas. In just two years, the number of Kansas players on rosters have dropped from 317 to a dismal 62. Some teams are taking heavy advantage of this rule, such as Highland with zero Kansas players on their roster. Also, Coffeyville was one of the teams that threatened to leave, but they’re second in the conference with 16 Kansas players on roster.
“With only 60 Kansas kids on roster it no longer needs to be called Kansas Jayhawk Conference because it’s no longer about Kansas, we’ve removed Kansas from the equation,” Co-defensive Coordinator Jordan Abbott said. “And that’s not what we wanted, that’s not what we as Butler wanted but when the conference goes majority rules that’s what happens. But that’s why we recruit so many Kansas kids and we stay true to it because that’s what we have always wanted, we have never wanted to abandon that culture.”
On October 20, 2016, the conference schools all met at Butler and voted unanimously to remove the restrictions. Everyone else in the conference except Butler and Coffeyville have three Kansas football players or less. Butler leads the way with 33 on roster, Coffeyville with 16, Dodge City with three, Fort Scott with three, Hutch with three, Independence with two, Garden City with two and Highland with zero.
It’s obvious that Head Coach Tim Schaffner and his staff have established a culture and way of doing things and plan on sticking to them no matter what the conference’s roster rules are.
