Minnesota State High School League

The MSHSL was founded in 1916 as the State High School Athletic Association (SHSAA) in order to promote and regulate school athletics. It later expanded its mission to include fine arts programs. In 1922, SHSAA joined the National Federation of State High School Associations. In 1929, the State High School Athletic Association adopted a new name, the Minnesota State High School League, as well as a new vision. The League started accepting non-public schools' applications for admitance in 1974.[5]

In 1960, the MSHSL was sanctioned as a non-profit by a Minnesota State Statute.[5]

Beginning with the 2015 season, the MSHSL created geographic football districts for regular season scheduling. The change was designed to help programs having difficulty finding opponents for an eight-game schedule.[6]

In 2015, the MNHSL board approved a policy on transgender athletes that allowed those assigned male at birth that identify as female to be eligible for girls’ teams. Girls, and by extension athletes assigned female at birth that no longer identify as such, were already eligible to compete in boys' sports. The policy requires applying for eligibility, sets out criteria for approval including a written statement from a health care professional, and places the decision with the school's activities director. Religiously-affiliated private schools are exempt from the policy.[7]

THe MSHSL was the first state association to officially sanction women's hockey, adapted athletics, robotics, and clay target.[8][9][5]

2009 Boys AA Championship game at the Xcel Energy Center.

On April 17, 1975, the member schools of the Minnesota State High School League approved amendments that provided the changes necessary to implement reorganization for two class competition.[10] Prior to this, schools of all sizes were competing against each other. The idea behind the division was to reduce the inherent advantage that was given to the larger schools. The Board of Directors assigned the largest 128 schools by enrollment to the AA classification. All other member schools were assigned to Class A. Each class is then split into eight sections, with the number of teams in each section varying. In April 1983 the Board of Directors adopted a policy which assigned schools with a minimum enrollment of 500 students to Class AA and schools with an enrollment 1–499 to Class A. Depending on the number of schools participating in an activity, additional classes may be needed or no class system may be needed at all. The highest current class in any activity is AAAAAA (6A) for football.

The following sports are offered under the supervision of the MSHSL. All of these sports have a single elimination tournament at the end of the season which awards a state championship to the winning team. Some sports also award individual championships as well.

For a complete list of state championship winners by sport see the list of Minnesota State High School League State Championships.

Because of the large number of high schools and large distances spanned between some of them, many schools are organized into conferences. These conferences, which, according to Minnesota State High School League rules, must have a minimum of five members, are usually composed of schools that are in close geographic proximity and have similar enrollments. During the regular season, a school plays a number of its games against other teams in its conference (this number varies depending on the sport and conference in question). However, unlike with organizations such as the California Interscholastic Federation or Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association, a team's conference standing has no bearing on its postseason. Since every team makes the playoffs and seeding is done at the discretion of the section, a team's conference performance has no direct effect on its postseason fate. A team could win its conference, but still be seeded lower than teams that finished behind it due to other considerations such as overall record, or the strength of opponents. Often, teams from one conference are spread over different sections and sometimes different classes. Some single sport conferences also exist, especially for hockey.[13]

The following athletes are among those who were in Minnesota State High School League activities in high school:

Baseball

• Aaron Headrick - Maranatha Christian Academy
• Joe Mauer - Cretin-Derham Hall[14]
• Dave Winfield - Saint Paul Central[15]
• Joe Bue - Becker

Basketball

• Paul Sather - Princeton[16]
• Kris Humphries - Hopkins
• Tre Jones - Apple Valley
• Tyus Jones - Apple Valley
• Mark Olberding - Melrose
• Khalid El-Amin - Minneapolis North
• Lindsay Whalen - Hutchinson[17]
• Rashad Vaughn - Robbinsdale Cooper
• Gary Trent Jr. - Apple Valley

Hockey

• Matt Cullen - Moorhead
• Neal Broten - Roseau
• Jake Gardiner - Minnetonka
• Nick Leddy - Eden Prairie
• Nate Prosser - Elk River
• Anne Schleper - St. Cloud Cathedral[18]
• Nate Schmidt - St. Cloud Cathedral
• Krissy Wendell - Park Center[19]

Football

• Adam Thielen - Detroit Lakes
• Eric Decker - Rocori-Cold Spring
• Chris Weinke - Cretin-Derham Hall
• James Laurinaitis - Wayzata
• John Carlson- Litchfield
• Karl Klug- Caledonia
• Isaac Fruechte- Caledonia
• Frank Ragnow - Chanhassen
• Amani Hooker - Park Center
• Larry Fitzgerald - Academy of Holy Angels
• C. J. Ham - Duluth Denfeld
• Tom Compton - Rosemount
• Billy Turner (American football) - Mounds View[20]
• Joe Haeg - Brainerd
• Maxx Williams - Waconia
• Tyler Johnson - Minneapolis North[21]

• Minnesota State High School League
• MSHSL Yearbook & Record Book