After months of discussion, the OIA has decided to institute a rule forcing many transfers to sit out from their sport for a year.
League principals approved the rule, which kicks in for the 2015-16 academic year, by an 18-0 vote.
OIA executive director Raymond Fujino said the new rule comes with an appeals process. In a case where a family moves to a new district out of necessity, an appeal could be heard.
The new rule will require a student-athlete to sit out one calendar year in any sport he or she previously played at the varsity level. For the most part, though, the new rule is in effect because of transfers in football.
Transfering has become a growing concern in high school football in recent years, most prominently at Kaiser and Mililani. The hiring of former University of Hawaii assistant coach Rich Miano spurred an influx of football transfers during his two seasons at Kaiser. Miano said openly that he and his staff would do their best to "recruit" football players to the program, which had been struggling in Division II.
Mililani was also drawing a large number of transfers during that time, though coach Rod York never uttered the "R" word. York, another former UH player, insisted that he never reached out to players or parents to lure them to Mililani.
With those two programs rolling up victories and collecting more talent, administrators began to ratchet up discussions about changing the transfer rule.
Miano left the job after last season, and the chatter around a rule change seemed to simmer down. However, things heated up again when a Kauai student-athlete left that campus during the preseason to transfer to Kaiser, where Cameron Higgins is now the head coach.
Kauai also lost two starting offensive linemen to Saint Louis in June. The number of programs that have been hit by departing transfers is another big factor in the rule change. There are families that have children attending different high schools to take advantage of better programs, whether sports or other extracurricular activities.
Red Raiders coach Tommy John Cox already had plans to leave coaching after the season.
"I decided a while ago that this year is it. But when you lose your three best players, it’s kind of tough. I tried to tell these guys, if you’re good, (colleges) will find you. But nowadays, I think it’s more about the parents. They go to so many camps and get seen, I don’t know how much the regular season has a bearing on how they get recruited," Cox said. "The high schools sell it to the parents, schools like Kaiser. We’ve lost kids to Kaiser two years in a row."
