4A Multi-year improvement


From year to year, some teams improve and some teams do not. Let’s assume that 1/2 of the teams rise in the rankings from one year to the next (24 teams). So after two years 12 teams should have improved over this span (1/2)*(1/2)*48.

It turns out that only 5 teams have shown consecutive improvement from 2007 to 2008 to 2009. One possibility is that if a 4A western team gets blowout out in the finals (2009 IC High 42 Marshalltown 14), all western teams get downgraded 28 points and correcspondingly a lot of positions. So perhaps for classes 3A-A, with their vast network of inter-connected games, this is a more meaningful report.

Nonetheless, here are the 5 4A teams:

Team               07 08 09
Davenport Central  41 41 22
DM Roosevelt       43 43 42
Pleasant Valley    32 30 24
Urbandale          36 16 11
WDM Dowling        17  3  2

So what about 2006? Did any teams have a 3 year run?

Team               06 07 08 09
Davenport Central  45 41 41 22
Pleasant Valley    40 32 30 24
Urbandale          37 36 16 11

And 2005?

Team               05 06 07 08 09
Urbandale          38 37 36 16 11

Urbandale is the current leader of long-range improvement. After mainly top-half finishes early in the decade ( 01 #15, 02 #21, 03 #18, 04 #25), Urbandale found a bottom in 2005 at #38. Since then they have had continuous improvement.

Honorable mention:

Team               05 06 07 08 09
Marshalltown       40 35 18 19 12
CR Washington      15 14  7  8  5