THE FRONT ROW with MARK NELKE: Now spring sports get their turn with MaxPreps

The fall and winter sports made it through the new seeding process for state tournaments without too much controversy.

Now it’s baseball and softball’s turn.

Both will use MaxPreps rankings to seed the eight teams in each state tournament. It’s the first year of a two-year trial run where the Idaho High School Activities Association is using this format to seed the teams once they qualify for state. In the past, the IHSAA “seeded” the tourneys by trying to pit district/regional champions vs. runners-up or worse in the first round whenever possible.

SOMETIMES, MOST notably in 3A, because there were five district champions statewide, two district champs would be matched up against each other in the first round — and sometimes, those were the best two teams in the state.

Using the MaxPreps rankings is designed to eliminate that possibility.

“There were a few times we were ranked No. 1 in the state (and got a tougher first-round draw than expected),” seventh-year Timberlake coach Casi Lupinacci said.

As far as playing tougher teams to boost a team’s MaxPreps ranking …

“I know some of the teams up north, it doesn’t help them, but I think we have enough 5A and 4A and Washington teams we could play, that it would help us,” said Lupinacci, whose team routinely plays 4A and sometimes 5A schools in Idaho.

“I didn’t like the bracket,” she said. “Last year, if we would have lost the district tournament, we would have had an easier road than the team that placed first.”

At least in softball, while one loss does not (usually) knock you out of title contention, it does make the road back to the championship round longer.

“It’s probably not as big, because we are a double-elimination tourney,” Lupinacci said. “Our tournament is more forgiving than a basketball tournament.”

In basketball, of course, one loss does knock a team out of title contention.

While baseball is sanctioned by the IHSAA, its state tournaments are not sponsored by the state, so theoretically baseball could seed its state tourneys however it wants.

However, baseball tries to use roughly the same seeding theories used in other sports, so the coaches group which runs state baseball opted to use MaxPreps rankings as well.

AT ST. MARIES, Todd Bitterman has taken the Lumberjacks to state eight times in his 14 seasons as coach.

Last year, he noted, the three top-ranked teams — Malad, West Jefferson and St. Maries — were all on the same side of the bracket.

Malad beat St. Maries in the first round, beat West Jefferson in the second round, then beat West Jefferson again in the championship.

St. Maries bounced back from its first-round loss to beat Nampa Christian and Declo in the consolation bracket, then lost to West Jefferson and finished fourth.

With that in mind, Bitterman said he’s likely in favor of using MaxPreps to seed the state tourney.

“I’m not opposed to it,” he said.

THEN THERE’S Lake City, which has been snakebit several times at state — but mostly due to the weather, not because of the bracketing.

“I think it’s going to be interesting,” eighth-year Timberwolves coach Jesse Lenz said. “In basketball, it seemed like the seedings worked out (at state).”

In 2019, he recalled, Lake City brought an undefeated team to state. But heavy rains shortened the 5A tournament to single-elimination, five-inning games, and the T-Wolves lost to Mountain View 1-0 in the fifth inning in the semis.

“I’m not sure there’s a perfect system,” Lenz said, “but that was the worst.”

Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 208-664-8176, Ext. 2019, or via email at mnelke@cdapress.com. Follow him on Twitter @CdAPressSports.