North Star had good idea - just a little late

In 2014, the North Star League football-playing teams combined with Whitepine League football-playing teams to form the White Star League.

The theory was, by combining, the new league would get two berths to the state playoffs — which sounded enticing to the North Star League, which was looking at perhaps receiving only a partial playoff berth had its schools remained in its own league.

The reality, as it turned out, was worse.

No North Star League team has qualified for the playoffs since the Whte Star League was formed. Each season, both playoff teams ­— Deary and Kendrick — have come from the Whitepine League.

A North Star League team hasn’t made the playoffs since Kootenai advanced in 2013.

North Star teams have come close.

Lakeside and Clark Fork tied for third last year, but neither beat Deary or Kendrick. Ditto 2016, when Lakeside tied for third. In 2014, Lakeside and Clark Fork were part of a three-way tie for third.

But it was always a distant third.

AFTER LAST season, officials from the North Star League told the Whitepine League they were dissolving the White Star League in football, and Kootenai, Lakeside, Clark Fork and Mullan (which eventually became Mullan-St. Regis) re-formed the North Star League in football. They figured the North Star, with its four teams, would get one berth to the state playoffs, and the Whitepine, with its four teams, would also get one berth.

“We made a bunch of calls; we thought it was a done deal,” Lakeside athletic director Ron Miller said.

Then sometime in August, one of the North Star coaches noticed the bracket for the state 1A Division II playoffs still listed berths for “1-2A” and “1-2B” — as though the North Star (District 1) and Whitepine (District 2) were still combined.

The North Star League contacted the Idaho High School Activities Association, and was told the brackets for this year had already been voted on and approved by the IHSAA last November. “By the time we requested it, they had already published the playoff brackets for this year,” Miller said. “So we had to live with it.”

If the North Star wanted to change something for this year, it had to have proposed something to the IHSAA prior to last November. The league hadn’t even met on the matter until after last November.

The White Star League would be so for one more year.

Miller and his assistant AD, Jerel Hight, are working on a proposal for next season — which would return the four North Star teams to the NSL for football — and plan to turn it in to the IHSAA.

Fortunately, all the White Star teams were already scheduled to play each other this season.

MILLER SAID he’s afraid the lack of success of North Star League football teams in recent years — and with little hope of making the playoffs under the current setup — will lead to less turnout for teams, and less fan interest.

Being guaranteed a playoff berth could re-energize interest, he said — and North Star coaches in the preseason spoke of their excitement of only having to beat the other North Star teams to make it to the state playoffs.

Until they were eventually told that was not the case.

Meanwhile, of the four North Star schools, Clark Fork has the best chance to break the Whitepine stranglehold on playoff berths this year. The Wampus Cats have already beaten Kootenai, Lakeside and Mullan-St. Regis, and will likely have to beat either Kendrick or Deary to reach the playoffs.

“I’m hoping Clark Fork pushes through and can beat Deary and/or Kendrick, so the North Star gets some representation in the playoffs,” Miller said.

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.