The teams upstate have 9 out of 10 years have had a speed advantage on our SWVA teams. As far as I can tell that has not changed over the last 30 years LOL(however I think that on avg teams are faster now than 10 to 15 years ago) what has changed is the State championship game is now played on Turf which seems to help faster teams. I don't think that the overall size of the players today is less than in years past but with enrolment in our school dropping like a rock most teams are now forced to start kids younger than in years past( Justin Hamilton was only the 3rd Freshman to be a starter for Clintwood since 1980) this year Clintwood started 3 Freshmen younger lees mature players will be smaller on avg.

I had the opportunity to watch Giles play at Haysi and They were the better team but not bigger,stronger,faster than our SWVA teams (Just better this year) Probably the biggest difference between Giles and Haysi was that after Cook(who was an outstanding player) for Giles the rest of there team was solid with no week links where as Haysi had Jones (Also a heck of a player but not on the Cook level) and a solid supporting cast BUT there were 2 or 3 on Offence that were without a doubt week links and the same on D.