MAC is Ohio's best conference

The Midwest Athletic Conference is the best small-school football conference in Ohio.
If there was any question as to the truth to that statement, last season proved it.
One conference. Three state champions.
It was the first time in state history that a single conference had three football state champions.
Impressive? Yes.
What’s more remarkable is that it has a chance to do it again — in back-to-back years.
“I’d say for the Midwest Athletic Conference it is a tremendous honor to have three schools competing for the state championship again,” said Don Kemper, the conference’s commissioner. “The student athletes at the schools work very hard to get to this point. It is great to see their hard work turn into an opportunity to play for a state title.”
In the last 10 years, the MAC has dominated the state title games, winning 16 championships. Marion Local has won four in a row, the last two in Division VII and the others in Division VI. The Flyers have six total championships in the last decade, including back-to-back in 2006 and 2007 in Division VI.
Marion Local (13-1), which has a record 24 straight playoff wins, is vying for its fifth consecutive title at 10 a.m. Friday against Kirtland (13-1) in the Division VI final.
Coldwater is second in the conference with five titles in the last decade. The Cavaliers (14-0) have dominated Division V by winning three straight championships, and they have reached the state final in each of the last six years. They also won in 2005 and 2007.
Since 2005, Coldwater has failed to reach the title game twice, once in 2006 and again in 2008. The top-ranked Cavaliers meet Canton Central Catholic (10-3) in the Division V final at 10 a.m. Friday.
St. John’s, has two Division VI state championships in the last decade (2008 and 2010), with St. Henry (Division V – 2006) and Minster (Division VI – 2014) claiming the other two.
“One of the things people like to talk about is … small school football in Ohio and how the MAC has dominated that segment of the tournament,” said Kemper, a 1981 Fort Recovery High School graduate. “I wish I could come up with an answer why that happens.”
With the exception of 2002, the MAC has had at least one team play for a state championship every year since 1994. During that span, 1996, 2002 and 2009 are the only years the MAC has not won a title.
Prior to 2013, football in Ohio was divided into six divisions. A seventh was added that year to help the disparity in enrollment between the biggest schools and the smallest schools. What it did, too, is break up schools with smaller enrollments into more divisions as well.
“The MAC had already been good in Division V and Division VI historically,” Kemper said. “They added a seventh and guess what? That is our niche. We have small schools and good football programs.”
Both Marion Local and Coldwater are heavy favorites — calpreps.com has the Cavaliers winning 34-14 and the Flyers favored 31-10 — and should those predictions hold it would be the fourth consecutive year the MAC has had two state champions.
Friday, Fort Recovery can help complete the trifecta again.
And by playing state-caliber competition on a weekly basis through the regular season, coach Brent Niekamp is a firm believer that the conference has helped his team prepare for the tough battles in the postseason.
“I think playing in the MAC forces you to get better throughout the course of the season. It does force you to take a good hard look at yourself and see where you’ve got to improve,” said Niekamp, whose team is making its first appearance at the state finals. The eighth-ranked Indians play the Mogadore Wildcats at 3 p.m. Friday at Ohio Stadium in Columbus. According to calpreps.com, Mogadore is a three-point favorite, 24-21.
“You don’t necessarily get that if you’re playing competition that’s not very good,” Niekamp said. “In the MAC that even happens in games that you win.
“We were fortunate enough to win some games that we could turn around and go ‘We’ve got work to do.’”
So while the tough competition in the MAC week in and week out has prepared teams for the postseason, conference teams have been turning it into success.
Coldwater and Marion Local have been mainstays in the state title games. Between them they have 13 — Marion Local has eight, tied for second-most in the state — of the MAC’s 33 total football state championships.
The Versailles Tigers are seven-time state champions, though only one came as a member of the MAC. Versailles joined in 2001 and won two years later.
St. John’s and St. Henry both have six state championships, and Minster, which won Division VI last year and lost to Fort Recovery in the regional championship this season, has one.
Taking away the six Versailles won outside of the MAC, the conference still has 27 championships, five more than any other in the state. In the last 20 years, the MAC is 24-9 in title games.
Friday, the Indians finally have their chance to contribute to the winningest conference in the state.
“As a Fort Recovery alumnus it is something that is very special to me,” said Kemper. “I have seen Fort Recovery come a long way from starting football (in 1992) to the point they are today. I know it hasn’t been easy.
“Brent had done a great job over there. He’s built it the right way … Brent’s success as a coach is what I really appreciate as an alumnus and commissioner of the MAC.”
Niekamp is proud of the opportunity to represent the conference.
“Excited to have a chance to hold up our end of it,” he said. “It’s a big deal. The MAC has garnered a pretty solid reputation around the state and we have to uphold that.”