THE FRONT ROW with MARK NELKE: Tweaking state basketball tourneys an intriguing idea

It was hard to find someone who wasn’t happy that the Idaho High School Activities Association voted to allow a shot clock at the state boys and girls basketball tournaments, beginning with the 2024 tourneys.

Most folks said a shot clock was a necessary, but not exactly critical, addition to Idaho high school basketball. Most teams play fast enough where the 35-second shot clock would rarely come into play.

But the clock will now make it harder for teams to slow the game down when they are either overmatched, or losing momentum.

And it will reward a team for playing strong defense; the other team can’t just “back it out” and “set it up again” when it has difficulty getting into its offense.

And some suggested coaches will have to get more creative in making sure their team gets a good shot off within 35 seconds, and/or a good shot — not just a heave — when the shot clock is winding down.

MAYBE THE more intriguing thing to come out of last week’s IHSAA board meeting was a proposal to change the way teams qualified for the state 1A Division I basketball tournaments.

The proposal, from the Whitepine League in District 2, would send the five district tournament champions throughout the state directly to the eight-team quarterfinals.

Then, the next six best teams, as determined by MaxPreps rankings at the end of the regular season, would meet in play-in games to determine the final three spots in the quarters.

That’s how many of the state football playoff fields in Idaho are determined — district (league) champs automatically get in, then MaxPreps rankings decide the rest of the field.

The 5As use a different format, but the 4As (16 teams), 3As (11), 2As (11) and 1A Division Is (12) do it the MaxPreps way.

The IHSAA board of control voted 6-4 against this proposal. However, the fact that the board was split on the idea, and discussion was lengthy, bodes well for an idea like this getting approved in the future.

Had that been in effect this past season, Lakeside’s boys (1A Division I) and Clark Fork’s boys (1A Division II) would have qualified for state as District 1 champions, and moved directly to the eight-team quarterfinals.

But this year, the District 1 champs had to face the third-place team from District 2 in a state play-in game, and both Lakeside and Clark Fork lost.

The girls had to take the same route to state from District 1. But while Clark Fork lost its play-in game, Wallace (1A Division I) won its.

Each tourney generally has one or two play-in games already, but those teams are determined by district tournament finish, not by MaxPreps rankings.

WHAT IF this change in format was expanded to the other state basketball tournaments?

For one, Coeur d’Alene’s girls, which finished third in the final MaxPreps rankings, would have at least gotten into a play-in game to state. As it was, the Vikings, who won the league title, were upended by No. 2 seed Lake City in the regional title game. Then, two days later, Cd’A was upset by third-seeded Post Falls, and saw its season end.

Also, the 5As only have three district champions — all other classifications have five. So in 5A, would they take the next 10 teams based on MaxPreps rankings, rather than the next six in all the other divisions?

Lake City (No. 1 in the final regular-season MaxPreps rankings), Boise (5) and Thunder Ridge (4) were the district champs, and Timberline (2), Post Falls (5), Rigby (7), Borah (8) and Rocky Mountain (11) played their way in the usual way.

Under the (modified) proposed format, play-in games would have been Coeur d’Alene (3) vs. Owyhee (12), Timberline (2) vs. Highland (13), Post Falls (5) vs. Rocky Mountain (11), Rigby (7) vs. Eagle (10) and Borah (8) vs. Lewiston (9).

Lewiston went two-and-out at regionals. Post Falls played its way into state by beating Owyhee in a state-play in. The Trojans would have been in a play-in game anyway under the proposed format, but in some years the third-place finisher in a four-team league would have had to win its regional title to go to state, because it wouldn’t have had a good enough ranking to make the play-in round.

If nothing else, this proposal is interesting discussion fodder for social media anyway — at least until the next time a group brings a similar idea to the board.

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.