If a school does not want to play football, why make them? Cost alone for a field and stadium now would be a major obstacle for most small rural schools. Forcing people to do something they dont want to do isnt really a good solution to anything.
8man will not come back, there was a very small push a few years ago by 1A schools refusing to play 6man to maybe get 8man back and it died a quick death. Of the 100+ 6man coaches (and schools) probably less than 20 would want to do that. I have said this before and some maybe new and not aware of it...The main reason Texas chose 6man over 8man is because the purpose of having an alternative to 11man is so small schools that struggle with numbers (or participation) would have a style of football to play and 6man is better for that by the simple fact it requires less players to field a team...it was better for schools who had around 20 players to develop and play other players and some to possibly even have a JV, where they wouldnt in 8man. It was the better option and still is. The coaches' association knows this and I seriously doubt they would ever want 8man back.
Competition has always had a wide disparity at the smallest sports level, that will never change. As we all know schools go through cycles of having athletic kids or enough kids to be competitive. It was true in 1938 Texas 6man as it is true today, and it was true in 8man when we had it.
Also what competition are you talking about? Simply from top to bottom all season or is this a reflection of playoff game scores? If the wide divide in playoff game scores, especially the state games, is the catalyst for this topic then the solution would be get rid of the division split, that would create much better playoff matchups mainly in the State games. However, that would not help many of the small schools compete at the district level really....also worth adding is getting rid of the two divisions will not happen either.
In short the only real way is for school districts who want to be better or do better is to develop their kids by hiring coaches that are best for them to do that...and the towns to address their own factors that contribute to whatever their issue(s) are...be it an aging population with less and less kids, or a declining population with less and less people (thus less kids). Social and economic issues in rural towns are more to the issue for some. As an example I will use Novice who is no longer a school...they would always have a talented player or two...but only had 6-8 players...and even Harley Ethridge coached there once upon a time...and they were rarely competitive...division splits, 8man, hiring coaches...none of that would fix that.
