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The seeds of state hoops in Idaho

| February 14, 2018 10:05 PM

Ideally, you would like a tournament to be bracketed so the only way the top two teams would meet is in the finals.

But sometimes it doesn’t work out that way.

At least in Idaho, anyway.

Take the state girls basketball tournaments, which in all six classifications begin today and run through Saturday in the Boise area.

In 3A, the top two teams are No. 1-ranked Sugar-Salem and No. 2 Timberlake. But both landed on the same half of the bracket, so if both teams win today, they will meet Friday in a semifinal game. Last year, they squared off in the state title game, with Timberlake winning in overtime to repeat as state champs.

It could have happened in 4A, had Borah knocked off top-ranked Eagle in the championship of the District 3 tournament. That would have put Eagle and second-ranked Post Falls on the same side of the bracket, and destined to meet in the semifinals for a second straight year.

COACHES USUALLY say they don’t care who they play, or when they play them.

No need to worry about things you can’t control.

But we can.

The Idaho High School Activities Association “seeds” its tournaments way ahead of time by districts — it schedules district champions to play non-district champions on the first day. And for districts sending more than one team to state, the IHSAA tries to put the second-place team on the opposite side of the bracket from the district champ.

This year in the first round, the District 3 champion (3A) opens against the winner of a play-in game between the District 1-2 runner-up (1-2B) and the District 3 fifth-place team (3E).

The other matchups — District 5-6 champ (5-6A) vs. District 3 third-place team (3C), District 1-2 champ (1-2A, Post Falls) vs. District 3 fourth-place team (3D), and the District 3 runner-up (3B) vs. the District 5-6 runner-up (5-6B).

That works about as well as you might expect, unless there is an upset at districts. Also, in 3A, there are five district champions, so one of the first-round matchups is always going to consist of two district champions. In 5A, there are only three district tournaments, hence two second-place teams meeting in one of the first-round games.

“We haven’t had any requests recently from schools to change the way we seed,” IHSAA executive director Ty Jones said. “Our board likes the idea of champions and runners-up on opposite sides of the bracket. I also like that idea.”

A SIMILAR scenario is shaping up to happen in the boys tournament in two weeks.

In 1A Division II, Genesis Prep and Dietrich are likely to meet in the semifinals. Genesis Prep beat Dietrich in last year’s state title game at the Idaho Center in Nampa.

This year, the “title game” could take place on a Friday afternoon at Rocky Mountain High in Meridian.

Washington has gone to an RPI system to seed its state tournaments. It’s not perfect, but it’s more accurate than drawing names out of a hat, like the state did for many years.

That old format might have made for good theatre, but there were also a few times when the top two teams were drawn to face each other in the first round of a 16-team tournament. Immediately, one top team’s state title hopes was going to be dashed, with the prospects of slogging through three consolation-round games in search of a trophy.

Again, as Jones said, no one has tried to suggest a better way, at least lately.

“Idaho has a unique set of issues for computer-based rankings,” Jones said. “Things such as no head-to-head games and travel can make RPI difficult. Plus you can have schools not playing each other so that their RPI would not go down.”

Seems like it might be worth looking at someday.

But maybe in the end, it doesn’t really matter. You play who you are scheduled to play, and if you keep winning, you get to play in the big arena on Saturday.

SIDE NOTE — Eagle and Post Falls are considered the top two girls teams in 5A. When they met in last year’s semifinals, Post Falls led late before Eagle came from behind to win. Eagle then lost in the title game, and Post Falls won the third-place game.

Both teams returned most, if not all (in Post Falls’ case) of their key players from last year. But while Eagle has garnered national attention (the Mustangs are ranked in USA Today’s top 25), Post Falls has mostly flown under the radar, losing only twice — and one was an 11-point loss at Central Valley that was much closer than that for most of the game. CV is favored to win a state title in Washington’s biggest classification. Aside from that loss and one at a national-caliber tournament in Las Vegas, Post Falls has pretty much dominated everyone else.

So how did Eagle get that much better than Post Falls since last February? I find that hard to believe.

Hopefully we’ll get to find out.

And if we do, fortunately, it will be on Saturday night, the last of six title games at the Idaho Center.

As it should be.

Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 664-8176, Ext. 2019, or via email at mnelke@cdapress.com. Follow him on Twitter@CdAPressSports.