January 19, 2017 at 6:14 p.m.
IHSAA needs to use seeds
Line Drives
All four major professional sports leagues have their playoffs seeded.
In the NFL, the top two teams in each conference get first-round byes.
After Wild Card weekend, the playoffs are reseeded so that the team with the best record plays the lowest remaining seed.
It’s a perfect system.
Major League Baseball has the winner of the single-game wild card game play the team that finished the regular season with the league’s best record.
It’s a system that works.
In the NBA, the team with the best record in the conference opens the playoffs with the team with the eighth-best record. The No. 2 seed plays the No. 7 seed, and so on. Once the bracket is set, there is no reseeding.
The NHL uses a slightly different format. Each of the conferences has two divisions, and the top three teams in each division qualify for the playoffs. The next two best teams, regardless of division, also make the playoffs as wild card teams. This creates eight-team brackets in each conference.
The NHL, too, is seeded, in that the team with the most regular-season points — hockey’s standings are slightly different than the other three major sports — plays the wild card team with the fewest points. The other division winner faces the next wild card team, and the teams that finish second and third in their division play one another in the first round.
It’s a system that, albeit confusing to the casual hockey fan, also works.
Then there’s the NCAA. For all the shots it takes for doing bizarre things — college athletes should be paid, for one, but that’s another column — it does the postseason right.
Every NCAA-sanctioned postseason tournament is seeded.
I will argue playoff hockey as the only thing that can rival the intensity that is the NCAA men’s basketball tournament. Maybe that’s just the hockey fan in me, but playoff hockey is something else.
March Madness, however, is a nearly perfect system.
Even college football has a playoff system, although some may argue, myself included, the four-team NCAA Division I playoff format still needs some work. Regardless, it’s much better than the previous Bowl Championship Series.
College and professional tournaments are seeded.
Every high school team tournament in Ohio is seeded, too.
But the IHSAA still relies on a lottery system to determine its postseason brackets.
What will it take for the IHSAA to change its ways?
Sunday was another example of how broken the IHSAA tournament draw is.
The Jay County High School girls basketball team, as of today, has a 13-7 record. It opens the Class 4A Sectional 6 tournament Jan. 31 against 2015 state runner-up Homestead. The Spartans are currently ranked second in the state and are 18-2. The winner advances to play the Fort Wayne South Side Archers, who are 11-7.
The other opening-round game pits the Muncie Central Bearcats (2-17) against the Wayne Generals (1-17). The winner meets the Huntington North Vikings (10-7) in the semifinal.
What’s wrong with this picture?
In the opening round, the teams with the two worst records in the sectional play one another, and the teams with the two best records meet each other. The teams with the third- and fourth-best records, meanwhile, get a bye into the semifinal.
I’m scratching my head too.
If the IHSAA seeded its tournaments based on record, the seeds for this sectional would be in order: Homestead, Jay County, South Side, Huntington North, Muncie Central and Wayne.
Homestead and Jay County would receive a bye to the semifinal. South Side (third seed) would play Wayne (sixth seed) in the opening round, with the winner facing Homestead. Huntington North (fourth seed) would play Muncie Central (fifth seed) and meet Jay County in the semifinal.
In this scenario, the top two teams couldn’t meet until the championship game.
Not entirely perfect, but it’s an improvement.
But there aren’t seeds, and the two best teams meet in the opening round.
Again, I’m scratching my head.
The 2009 sectional tournament — the junior year of current JCHS assistant coach Pazia Williams — is another example of just how a “blind draw” is a broken method.
Jay County was 18-0 entering the tournament that season and received a bye before losing in the semifinal to eventual sectional champion South Side.
If the IHSAA used seeds, the Archers, who were 16-4 and beat Homestead in the opening round, should have been the No. 2 seed and also received a bye. But that wasn’t the case. Instead, the two best teams met earlier than the championship game.
Not seeding the tournament does nothing but diminish the value of a win-loss record during the regular season.
What’s the point of having a regular season if — in the grand scheme of things — it has little impact on the draw for the postseason?
The IHSAA needs to seed its sectional tournaments, in every sport.
I just hope I’m still around to see it happen.
In the NFL, the top two teams in each conference get first-round byes.
After Wild Card weekend, the playoffs are reseeded so that the team with the best record plays the lowest remaining seed.
It’s a perfect system.
Major League Baseball has the winner of the single-game wild card game play the team that finished the regular season with the league’s best record.
It’s a system that works.
In the NBA, the team with the best record in the conference opens the playoffs with the team with the eighth-best record. The No. 2 seed plays the No. 7 seed, and so on. Once the bracket is set, there is no reseeding.
The NHL uses a slightly different format. Each of the conferences has two divisions, and the top three teams in each division qualify for the playoffs. The next two best teams, regardless of division, also make the playoffs as wild card teams. This creates eight-team brackets in each conference.
The NHL, too, is seeded, in that the team with the most regular-season points — hockey’s standings are slightly different than the other three major sports — plays the wild card team with the fewest points. The other division winner faces the next wild card team, and the teams that finish second and third in their division play one another in the first round.
It’s a system that, albeit confusing to the casual hockey fan, also works.
Then there’s the NCAA. For all the shots it takes for doing bizarre things — college athletes should be paid, for one, but that’s another column — it does the postseason right.
Every NCAA-sanctioned postseason tournament is seeded.
I will argue playoff hockey as the only thing that can rival the intensity that is the NCAA men’s basketball tournament. Maybe that’s just the hockey fan in me, but playoff hockey is something else.
March Madness, however, is a nearly perfect system.
Even college football has a playoff system, although some may argue, myself included, the four-team NCAA Division I playoff format still needs some work. Regardless, it’s much better than the previous Bowl Championship Series.
College and professional tournaments are seeded.
Every high school team tournament in Ohio is seeded, too.
But the IHSAA still relies on a lottery system to determine its postseason brackets.
What will it take for the IHSAA to change its ways?
Sunday was another example of how broken the IHSAA tournament draw is.
The Jay County High School girls basketball team, as of today, has a 13-7 record. It opens the Class 4A Sectional 6 tournament Jan. 31 against 2015 state runner-up Homestead. The Spartans are currently ranked second in the state and are 18-2. The winner advances to play the Fort Wayne South Side Archers, who are 11-7.
The other opening-round game pits the Muncie Central Bearcats (2-17) against the Wayne Generals (1-17). The winner meets the Huntington North Vikings (10-7) in the semifinal.
What’s wrong with this picture?
In the opening round, the teams with the two worst records in the sectional play one another, and the teams with the two best records meet each other. The teams with the third- and fourth-best records, meanwhile, get a bye into the semifinal.
I’m scratching my head too.
If the IHSAA seeded its tournaments based on record, the seeds for this sectional would be in order: Homestead, Jay County, South Side, Huntington North, Muncie Central and Wayne.
Homestead and Jay County would receive a bye to the semifinal. South Side (third seed) would play Wayne (sixth seed) in the opening round, with the winner facing Homestead. Huntington North (fourth seed) would play Muncie Central (fifth seed) and meet Jay County in the semifinal.
In this scenario, the top two teams couldn’t meet until the championship game.
Not entirely perfect, but it’s an improvement.
But there aren’t seeds, and the two best teams meet in the opening round.
Again, I’m scratching my head.
The 2009 sectional tournament — the junior year of current JCHS assistant coach Pazia Williams — is another example of just how a “blind draw” is a broken method.
Jay County was 18-0 entering the tournament that season and received a bye before losing in the semifinal to eventual sectional champion South Side.
If the IHSAA used seeds, the Archers, who were 16-4 and beat Homestead in the opening round, should have been the No. 2 seed and also received a bye. But that wasn’t the case. Instead, the two best teams met earlier than the championship game.
Not seeding the tournament does nothing but diminish the value of a win-loss record during the regular season.
What’s the point of having a regular season if — in the grand scheme of things — it has little impact on the draw for the postseason?
The IHSAA needs to seed its sectional tournaments, in every sport.
I just hope I’m still around to see it happen.
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