In most programs, whether its a top notch national program or a group of four kids in high school, the size of that program will almost always lead to higher rates of success. I will prove that by showing the total population of three towns, the enrollment numbers of the schools in that town, and the success the football team for that school has. The teams I will use are Kenyon-Wanamingo, Cannon Falls, and Rochester Lourdes. All these teams are in the Hiawatha Valley League in Minnesota.

The smallest school out of the three is the Kenyon-Wanamingo Knights. Kenyon and Wanamingo are two separate towns, but the population of each are so small, the towns decided to have one school for the two towns. The town population of the two towns put together is 2,904 people. According to the Minnesota State High School League, in 2012, Kenyon-Wanamingo had a total enrollment of 230 students in grades 9-12 . Assuming only half of that number are males, the Knights football coach has less than 120 students to try to have play for him, even the boys who haven’t touched a football in their life. The coach ended up getting 34 boys who had a good enough skill set to meet his standards for playing on the K-W varsity football team. With only that amount of players, they didn’t do too bad ending with a regular season record of 3-4 in the AA Minnesota Football League, and went on to beat WEM in a playoff game, and they ended their playoff run with a loss to Pine Island in the second round of the playoffs. Their only other out of conference game was against Cannon Falls, which they lost 40-0 in and a final season record of 4-6. K-W had a final state rank at 211 and a national rank of 10,714.

Cannon Falls, out of the three towns, was the town with the population in between, with a total population of 4,081; according to the United States Census Bureau. Although Cannon is bigger than Kenyon-Wanamingo, they are still a relatively small town with a total enrollment of 411 students in grades 9-12. With an enrollment number of more than 180 students more than Kenyon, our sports programs have a little more options to choose from than Kenyon does. Cannon Falls had a football team with a roster of 51 boys playing varsity football. The team was so big this year because the freshman and sophomores stayed with the team the whole year to letter and that put them on the roster. Being the first year Cannon moved up to the AAA Minnesota Football League, they competed pretty well with all of the bigger schools, playing a lot of close games. They ended with a regular season record of 1-5 and an overall record of 4-7. For having such a bad regular season, Cannon Falls made a pretty good run in the playoffs, beating Tri-City United and PEM on the way up to the Section Championship game, but had a tough loss to the Rochester Lourdes, losing 29-15. The Bombers were only one game away from making the state tournament. Cannon ended the season with a state rank of 64 and a national rank of 4,212.

The final town of the three is Rochester, which is one of the biggest towns in the state of Minnesota, with a town population of 108,992. Rochester is a little different from Kenyon and Cannon because there is over 15 different options of schooling in the high school level. The Rochester Lourdes are actually a private school with a total enrollment of 442. Being a private school, the school board has the option of enrolling you, so most of the kids who go to this school appear to have higher standards of those who go to public schools. Knowing that, you could assume that the skill set of the athletes might be higher, which means a lot of the kids who enroll at Lourdes High School want to succeed with sports and that led to a total roster of 42 students, most of them being highly athletic juniors and seniors. Having such a great skill set the Lourdes had a regular season record of 5-1. They beat Cannon for the Section Championship and went on the the state tournament beating Fairmont and advancing to the Semi-Finals to play, and lose to, the New London-Spicer Wildcats, 36-16. Rochester ended the season with a Section Championship and a AAA State tournament contender. According to MaxPreps, the Lourdes had a state rank of 28 and a national rank 2,074.

After I just showed you these three teams, their town populations, enrollment number in the school, the number of students on the varsity football roster, and the different types of success they have, it is pretty easy to say that the schools with more overall population, whether in the school or the town, have more success in sports. I chose Kenyon-Wanamingo, Cannon Falls, and Rochester because their town populations vary with size and that affects how the schools show themselves to the rest of the state. For example, Rochester has a bigger population by over 100,000 people, so most people could expect the school will be nicer than the school with a town population of 2,000 like Kenyon. This is why I say that if a school will grow in size, they will more than likely grow in success.