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Mike West
July 22, 2024
By Loren Kopff • @LorenKopff on X
There were some tough shoes to fill for Mike West when he replaced Rob Wigod as commissioner of the CIF-Southern Section a little over a year ago. But, as he enters his second academic school year as the section’s 10th commissioner, he is ready for the new challenges that awaits him.
“It’s been a great job,” said West. “I’m very, very happy with the move from being a high school principal to being the commissioner of the [CIF-SS]. There are a lot of things I miss [as a] high school [principal] with those types of things. But to focus in on athletics; to work with such a great group at the section office, to be able to help plan for and implement all the championship events that take place throughout the year has been a great experience for me.”
In his first year as the new commissioner, West said he didn’t intentionally try to do much in terms of making changes, but instead wanted to learn what was going on and try to keep things as much status quo as possible. One of the major things that he wanted to do was ‘take the ball and help carry it through’, which was initiated by Wigod coming out of the pandemic was the same season playoff system.
“This next coming year, I’m hoping to maybe get a few new things going on,” he said. “I’m trying to get some student voice involved and look to expand our unified sports opportunities for students, not just in track and swim, but perhaps some other things. We’re trying to get a little expansion coming in this next year. But in my first year, I really tried to keep things where they were.”
West had been a high school principal for the past 13 years, first at Jurupa Valley High, then at Martin Luther King High where he was since 2015. That same year, West became a member of the Southern Section Executive Committee. Learning the job as a CIF section commissioner was the biggest challenge West faced last year, having been on the education side at the high school level his entire career.
Another challenge West faced last year was the boycotting of high school soccer officials during the winter months, which the section was able to overcome. He went on to state that he hopes that problem doesn’t arise this upcoming season.
“We’re not back to where we once were,” West continued. “The drain of officials seemed to has stopped. We’re starting to see, in some sports, an increase in the number of officials that are coming back. The biggest piece is retention; getting the officials not just to buy in, go through all the training, purchase all the equipment necessary and now all of the sudden they have a few games. Hopefully, we can keep them in for a few years so that they can really truly get ingrained in the systems.”
He went on to say that there is an increase in officials in football, baseball and other sports, but some sports not as much. However, he admitted that the section is still going to struggle with, what they believe, is an ‘inappropriate number of officials’ for probably a few more years.
Same season playoffs
Football is the only sport that will be entering its fourth season using the ‘same season’ format for putting together the playoff brackets once the regular season has been completed. West says there has been a tremendous amount of positive feedback from it. The first round games are much closer than they had been before the pandemic; not as much blowouts as before.
“We’re seeing a lot of schools now that haven’t had an opportunity to get into the playoffs in football fighting their way in, and being successful,” said West. “That’s because we have schools that might have been pigeonholed in a given division because of past performance, or a lack of past performance. All of a sudden, they have a great team however they got there. And those other schools that had been just good but not great, haven’t had the opportunity in the past. Now they’re finding avenues and opportunities to actually get to the top, which has been really, really neat to see.”
The old system was based on data from the previous season or the previous two seasons. Now, all the information needed to determine divisions and first round matchups will be based off the just completed season, and most sports will have the same process when it comes to putting the playoff brackets together. The exceptions to that are swimming, track and field, which uses their enrollment date to determine divisional alignment. While some coaches will have a general idea of what division their team will be in, it won’t be officially revealed until the brackets are released. What that means is the elimination of the weekly polls in all the sports.
“As long as you understand the premise behind competitive equity and you buy into that model for playoffs…and not all states do, not all areas do,” said West. “We’re unique in the Southern Section, by far, in the country when it comes to trying to make our matchups as good as possible and equitable as possible.”
One of the topics of conversation with the same season format has been the way coaches schedule their non-league opponents: do they schedule easy in the hopes of a sure win which in turn gets that team a better record and potentially a higher division or do they still schedule the way they also have been?
“If you are playing someone ranked to a point where you should beat them, then you get a certain number of points because you should beat them,” he says. “If you beat someone that perhaps you shouldn’t beat, you get raised up. So, regardless of your scheduling, if you’re going to schedule teams that you should beat, I don’t see [your division status] dropping necessarily because you’re actually where you need to be.”
West believes coaches should be finding teams that they’re relatively competitive with, find an avenue to compete against them, prepare themselves well for postseason play and ‘roll the dice and go’.
According to West, different sports will have different systems used for rankings. CalPreps.com will be used for football only, Scorebook Live for basketball, and Massey for several sports are some of the examples. What the CIF-SS is looking to do is midway through a season, publish what the rankings are of the system that they’re using at that point in time.
Girls beach volleyball and girls flag football
The 2024 fall season will mark the second for girls flag football and the 2025 spring season will mark the third for girls beach volleyball, the two newest CIF-SS sanctioned sports. That now brings the number of sports to 22, including traditional competitive cheer and stunt.
West had the opportunity to see the girls beach volleyball playoffs near the Huntington Beach pier, not just the team playoffs, but the pairs tournament as well and commented that it was ‘fantastic to watch’.
“The growth there has been great,” said West. “Volleyball for the girls has always been popular. It’s just in a different venue now and schools that have the facilities for beach [volleyball] are taking advantage of that. It’s unfortunate that not all schools have those venues because my guess is if you actually had three to five sandlot courts on your campus, you would be doing beach volleyball. It’s just another avenue for females to get involved.
“The exponential growth of flag football has been tremendous, and it’s only going to continue,” he continued. “We had about 150 schools this last year participate, and we could have as many as 100 more this year. You’re seeing the ads for it on [television] now and the NFL is really promoting it; it’s going to become an Olympic sport.”
Traditional competitive cheerleading and stunt
Although not a new sport to high schoolers, competitive cheerleading is becoming more recognized as a CIF sanctioned sport. Now, a new component is being added to its championships. The CIF-SS divisional traditional competitive cheerleading championships will be held on Jan. 25 with the state championships a week later.
“The interesting thing is competitive cheer has been around for the longest time, but it’s just been in its own little world,” said West. “A number of years back, the CIF recognized cheer as a sanctioned sport. So, we’re now trying to wrap our head around how to promote it and be a part of it.”
West said the CIF-SS is looking to try to have some other tournaments throughout the year to help schools qualify for the championships. But West is excited about stunt being added to the mix and predicts it should take off. Stunt cheer, not to be confused with the popular pom pom cheer, will be a spring sport held inside gymnasiums. One team faces off against another team doing the exact routines simultaneously while being judged on how well they do.
“We don’t have enough schools quite yet to make it a championship [sport], but once we do, I think it’s going to sail,” said West.
Baseball and softball state championships
One of the biggest debates with each spring has centered around life after the baseball and softball divisional championships, which will fall on May 31, 2025. Unlike football, basketball and girls volleyball, there are no true North vs. South state championships; just Northern California and Southern California State Regionals, which will be held the first week of June.
These two sports began to have regionals in 2021, but the finals were held on June 26 when most players were already involved with their travel teams. Since then, the regional finals have been held the first Saturday of June. West says there will be a true state championship, but it won’t be without its potential pitfalls.
“Those all were implemented based upon a given schedule,” said West on the football and basketball state playoffs. “That schedule of implementation is still going. Boys volleyball is going to have their state [championships] this next year. Basically, the state looks at one or two sports a year. Initially, it was just to make state regionals, and now they’re actually going from state regionals to state championships. It’s part of the implementation plan. I can’t recall what year it will be, but between three and six years, you’ll see baseball and softball have their state championships.”
Divisional championship venues
West said he doesn’t believe the football finals will be held in a large venue like the Los Angeles Coliseum or the Rose Bowl in 2024 because of conflicts. The University of Southern California is hosting the University of Notre Dame and the University of California, Los Angeles is hosting Fresno State University on Nov. 30, respectively.
The CIF-SS divisional football finals are slated for Nov. 29 and 30. It should be noted that the Los Angeles Chargers and Los Angeles Rams are both on the road on Dec. 1, leaving a potential open spot at Sofi Stadium.
“We’ve had conversations with Sofi; they’ve seemed somewhat productive,” said West. “We like the individuals; we’ve had good conversations. We just haven’t found an avenue to really make it happen. We’ll continue to put out that olive branch and see what the possibilities are.”
However, the CIF-SS has a three-year agreement with the Toyota Arena in Ontario, home to the Ontario Reign of the American Hockey League, to host the basketball finals Feb. 28 and Mar. 1. West says there will be at least 10 games at that venue. Because there are so many divisions, some championship games will be played at Azusa Pacific University and at one high school, yet to be determined.
What’s new for the 2024-2025 school year
The new health and safety protocols will be put in place beginning in a few weeks when school starts. West says there are guidelines now for using the WetBulb Globe thermometers and measuring it throughout the day in order to make sure the practices are safe for all outdoor fall sports. But that’s not the only change this upcoming school year.
“All schools have to have an emergency action plan that’s practiced for each sport in each venue,” said West. “You have to have an AED (automated external defibrillator) within three minutes of a potential cardiac arrest on campus. The schools are going to be increasing their capacity to provide safety opportunities for their athletes and for their fans, in all honesty.”
First-time champions
The 2023-2024 school year saw the Cerritos High football, and boys basketball teams and the Gahr High softball team wins CIF-SS championships for the first time in school history. West admits it makes him proud to see new teams with a championship for the first time.
“There are 560 schools in our section and there are maybe three to five percent that get a lot of [publicity] and are well known nationally, not just in the section,” he said. “But you have 95 percent of those schools that aren’t as well known; do the best they can to do things the right way. And I like the fact that we can provide a student experience for the common high school; those that have been around for a while and to give them their opportunities to see the sunshine, to go to a nice venue and to have a great experience. There’s nothing better.
“Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind watching Mater Dei or St. John Bosco play football,” he continued. “It’s entertaining. But to watch a Gahr or a Cerritos come out and play their guts out to the level that they do and then are able to walk away with a plaque or a medal, that’s really the part of the job that I’ll never get over.”
