(Note: To see the complete list of schools and how they’re ranked, pick up the Preps issue of Mile High Sports. High School Rankings are based on performances in the calendar year 2025.)

The Rankings:

…

The Formula

For 23 years now, we’ve been charting Colorado’s high school athletic programs by using our famed “High School Rankings” – a list, born of a formula that’s miraculously stood the test of time.
The math doesn’t lie.
Back in the day, we set forth to create a mathematic equation of sorts designed to fairly evaluate which Colorado schools are the best at sports. We didn’t – and still don’t – care about the size of the school, or whether it’s closer to the capital or to Kansas. All that ever mattered to us is how each school performed on the court, field, ice or diamond.
Our patent-pending equations offers no subjectivity, only objectivity.

Here it is — the math behind the madness:

(Number of Team State Qualifiers / Total Sports Participated In) x 25
+
(Number of Team State Runner-Up Finishes / Total Sports Participated In) x 75
+
(Number of Team State Champions / Total Sports Participated In) x 200
+
(Number of Individual State Champs / Total Sports Participated In) x 20
+
(Number of First-Team All-State Athletes / Total Sports Participated In) x 20
=
TOTAL SCORE

…

The List

Unlike the magazine, where we count from No. 1 and move up, throughout the week, we will be counting down the top 50 as they fell in our 2025 rankings.

10: Colorado Academy Mustangs
Class: 3A
Enrollment: 449
Score: 77.35
Last Year: No. 4 (-6)

9: Resurrection Christian Cougars
Class: 3A
Enrollment: 355
Score: 79.33
Last Year: No. 21 (+12)

8: Haxtun Fightin’ Bulldogs
Class: 2A
Enrollment: 115
Score: 80.00
Last Year: No. 12 (+4)

7: Cherry Creek Bruins
Class: 5A
Enrollment: 3803
Score: 86.03
Last Year: No. 3 (-4)

6: The Classical Academy Titans
Class: 3A
Enrollment: 593
Score: 90.63
Last Year: No. 5 (-1)

5: Simla Cubs
Class: 2A
Enrollment: 106
Score: 91.43
Last Year: No. 37 (+32)

4: Flatirons Academy Bison
Class: 1A
Enrollment: 81
Score: 91.67
Last Year: No. 7 (+3)

3: McClave Cardinals
Class: 1A
Enrollment: 72
Score: 107.22
Last Year: No. 13 (+10)

2: Kent Denver Sun Devils
Class: 3A
Enrollment: 510
Score: 115.67
Last Year: No. 11 (+9)

1: Idalia Wolves
Class: 1A
Enrollment: 53
Score: 115.83
Last Year: No. 62 (+61)

Teeny tiny Idalia did big, big things in high school rankings XXIII

(Dan Mohrmann/ColoradoPreps.com)

It’s fitting that Idalia High School, located in the far northeast corner of Colorado, just 15 miles from the Kansas border, won Mile High Sports High School Rankings XXIII.

Idalia, relative to plenty of cities and towns across the country, is, well, small. According to the World Wide Web, Idalia boasts 116 inhabitants. And according to the Colorado High School Activities Association, just under half of those citizens (53 to be exact) call themselves Wolves, competing for Idalia High. With a total enrollment of 53, the Wolves are Class 1A in CHSAA terms.

Fitting? That’s right. Fitting. Idalia might be small in numbers. But what it lacks in population, it makes up for in points.

Like the 825 of them they slapped on opponents during the past football season. That’s a state record by the way; nobody’s ever tallied more. It was equally fitting that the school possessing the record before Idalia snatched it away, was Stratton (with 822), whom the Wolves beat in the 6-man title bout. The game’s Most Outstanding Player, Gabe Kechter, galloped for 161 yards and three touchdowns, good for 18 points of his own.

The Wolves earned jusssst enough points when it came to girls track and field, as they were named 1A co-champs along with McClave. Sixty was the magic number there. Most of those same ladies played on the 1A runner up basketball team, too.

Fifty-three kids isn’t a lot, but the fact that 11.3 percent of the student body either won an individual state title or was named First-Team All-State is notable. That’s a big deal.

Maybe the biggest deal?

Idalia just posted the highest point total this publication seen in the 23-year history of High School Rankings.

The Wolves winning point total of 115.83 topped ‘em all, including Kent Denver’s valiant, but still runner-up, 115.67 effort. Caliche put up 115 even in 2015; Kit Carson posted a 108.33 in ’19. Cherry Creek, who has won our list a whopping six times (more than any other school), tallied a strong 106.82 – the biggest big school number ever – in 2021.

Perhaps the secret sauce in Idalia comes from a one-step-at-a-time approach, a strategy perhaps best summed up by head football coach Toby Kechter following the Wolves state championship and record-breaking season. Sometime during the week leading up to the game, Kevin Shaffer, the founder of Colorado Preps, reminded Kechter that Idalia was just 36 points from breaking Colorado’s all-time scoring record.

“‘Gee, thanks,’” Kechter told Shaffer. “We’re just trying to score 8 – the first touchdown of the game.”

Little did he know that the points his Wolves totaled in the 6-man finale would yield yet another record. By amassing the most points ever in Mile High Sports’ annual High School Rankings list, the big things done in the little town of Idalia are here for all to see.

Congratulations to the Wolves of Idalia, winners of High School Rankings XXIII.