New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

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elliott70
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Location: Bemidji

New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by elliott70 » Thu Mar 21, 2019 12:07 pm

1 EDINA
2 BLAINE
3 MINNETONKA
4 ANDOVER
5 EDEN PRAIRIE
6 ST THOMAS ACADEMY
7 CHASKA
8 DULUTH EAST
9 MAPLE GROVE
10 WAYZATA
11 BENILDE ST MARGARETS
12 MOORHEAD
13 OSEMOUNT
14 HOLY FAMILY
15 EAGAN
16 HILL MURRAY

You take the top 16 teams by some pre-determined measuring stick (in this case - pagestat).
They have a SUPER weekend - Friday and Saturday before state tourney.
Winners advance to AAA state tournament on Thurs - Sat.

Take the remaining 48 AA schools and set them up geographically for section play-offs on Friday - Saturday and finals on Tuesday before state tourney weekend the winners advance to Wed, Friday, Saturday state AA tournament.

The single A's play their normal sections with state tourney on Thursday, Friday, Saturday at Mariucci or another venue. (or Monday - Tuesday at the X in the AM - PM and then Saturday.

Or some version...
just a passing thought to get different names at the AA level.

Eagles93
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Joined: Sat Jan 03, 2004 5:04 pm

Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by Eagles93 » Thu Mar 21, 2019 12:39 pm

I LOVE this idea. Obviously it'll never happen as it makes too much sense but it solves a lot of current issues, most notably:
No more 1 vs 8 / 2 vs 7 blowouts that don't do either teams any good
Gives some actual hope for those perennial mid- to crummy-AA teams at having some postseason success

A small tweak that helps ensure regional representation is to take the top rated team from each section, then the next best eight according to the rankings:

1. EDINA (6AA)
2. BLAINE (5AA)
3. MINNETONKA (2AA)
4. ANDOVER (7AA)
5. EDEN PRAIRIE
6. ST THOMAS ACADEMY (3AA)
7. CHASKA
8. DULUTH EAST
9. MAPLE GROVE
10. WAYZATA
11. BENILDE ST MARGARETS
12. MOORHEAD (8AA)
13. ROSEMOUNT
14. HOLY FAMILY
15. HILL MURRAY (4AA)
16. LAKEVILLE SOUTH (1AA)

My idea assumes you keep the current sections for the AA section games, you just simply pluck the 16 best teams out of the sections, then seed the remaining teams.

Goose21
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by Goose21 » Thu Mar 21, 2019 12:49 pm

I'd go top 32 AA.
Play a super weekend in 2 or 4 locations.
Top 8 advance to State.
Forecheck, Backcheck, Paycheck

Eagles93
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by Eagles93 » Thu Mar 21, 2019 1:02 pm

Goose21 wrote:
Thu Mar 21, 2019 12:49 pm
I'd go top 32 AA.
Play a super weekend in 2 or 4 locations.
Top 8 advance to State.
If you go to 32 you're starting to get into Tier I/Tier II territory where AA is too watered down, IMO. I feel like winning the AA tourney with only 16 in AAA still feels like an accomplishment and less like a bigger participation trophy like Tier II was.

Goose21
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by Goose21 » Thu Mar 21, 2019 1:30 pm

Eagles93 wrote:
Thu Mar 21, 2019 1:02 pm
Goose21 wrote:
Thu Mar 21, 2019 12:49 pm
I'd go top 32 AA.
Play a super weekend in 2 or 4 locations.
Top 8 advance to State.
If you go to 32 you're starting to get into Tier I/Tier II territory where AA is too watered down, IMO. I feel like winning the AA tourney with only 16 in AAA still feels like an accomplishment and less like a bigger participation trophy like Tier II was.
I suppose it depends on the goal.

One way is more focused on getting as many top teams as possible to State.
The other is more about organizing teams into competitive levels.
Forecheck, Backcheck, Paycheck

zooomx
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by zooomx » Thu Mar 21, 2019 1:59 pm

There are 150 some teams in the state for boys hockey.

Top 49 (based on enrollment) are AAA and you have 7 sections of 7 teams geographically. Section winners advance to state. The top 2 ranked teams to lose in Section finals have a one game playoff to earn the 8th spot at state. This protects for those years that 2 of top 3 teams are both in one section.

Next 49 teams are in AA... same format.

The remaining teams are put in A and could either have the same format, or traditional sections.

The lower class will seem boring at first, but eventually the hierarchy will be formed and you will be able to find the next dominating team to be upset about. I think the middle class (AA) would be very intriguing. Class AAA wouldn't really change much from what we see at Class AA now.

Slap Shot
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by Slap Shot » Fri Mar 22, 2019 1:01 pm

No. Anything that gets rid of sections doesn't have my vote. The only way I would change the current system would be to combine the winners of each section (1AA - 8AA and 1A - 8A) into a 16 team tournament.

bodyup88
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by bodyup88 » Fri Mar 22, 2019 2:32 pm

Slapshot, which sections are you most interested in preserving and why?

That guy for that thing
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by That guy for that thing » Mon Mar 25, 2019 9:57 am

zooomx wrote:
Thu Mar 21, 2019 1:59 pm
There are 150 some teams in the state for boys hockey.

Top 49 (based on enrollment) are AAA and you have 7 sections of 7 teams geographically. Section winners advance to state. The top 2 ranked teams to lose in Section finals have a one game playoff to earn the 8th spot at state. This protects for those years that 2 of top 3 teams are both in one section.

Next 49 teams are in AA... same format.

The remaining teams are put in A and could either have the same format, or traditional sections.

The lower class will seem boring at first, but eventually the hierarchy will be formed and you will be able to find the next dominating team to be upset about. I think the middle class (AA) would be very intriguing. Class AAA wouldn't really change much from what we see at Class AA now.
How would opting up work? Would a team that ops up bump the next lowest down to AA and if an A-sized school wanted to move up to AAA, I am not sure where the cut off is nor how big teams like St. Thomas and other private schools are, would they have the trickle-down effect? I can think of 2 schools that already opt up to AA from the north that would likely jump to AAA (DE and GR) and who knows if, with this kind of a shakeup, Hermantown might just go all the way up, or sit in the AA area like I assume they will with the new enrollment cut-offs.

Slap Shot
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by Slap Shot » Mon Mar 25, 2019 12:54 pm

bodyup88 wrote:
Fri Mar 22, 2019 2:32 pm
Slapshot, which sections are you most interested in preserving and why?
All of them as far as format. I am not saying they can't be tweaked as far as placement, but reaching the state tournament should be an accomplishment. Upsets happen and that is part of the magic. To me a 2 class hockey tournament is far more fascinating than the bb and fb tournaments (5 and 6 classes respectively?) and it's because there's going to be some David and Goliath matchups. In FB for sure that will never happen again at the top level. In the first round this past season there was 1 upset in the first round out of 15 games - LS over CDH and not exactly a David over Goliath result. Perhaps in BB it's more frequent but I don't think so.

Grand Rapids' run a few years ago, Greenway this year, Holy Family upsetting Tonka in the section semis, Roseau won in '07 and made the semis in '08, etc.

And I say this as a fan of Tonka that has has some very, VERY good teams (5 seasons with between 19-24 wins) not reach state because they ran into Edina, Eden Prairie or BSM, and some others from the 80's that didn't win as much while playing the wicked Lake South and running into Edina at Met Center or when they lost to a .500 Richfield team when G Damien Rhodes played out of his mind. :evil: :P

I'd be ok taking the Top 2 in each section with the winner gaining a higher seed regardless of record (call it an adjusted PWR) and then there would be a 16 team tournament, or a 1-class tournament consisting of the 8A section winners and 8AA section winners seeded accordingly. Although that becomes difficilut in many ways as several A teams won't have very many games played against AA opponents.

However I am all in favor of leaving well enough alone. Any format change is not going to please everyone and we could be trying to fix something that really isn't broken in the first place.
Last edited by Slap Shot on Mon Mar 25, 2019 1:08 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Goose21
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by Goose21 » Mon Mar 25, 2019 1:03 pm

Slap Shot wrote:
Mon Mar 25, 2019 12:54 pm
bodyup88 wrote:
Fri Mar 22, 2019 2:32 pm
Slapshot, which sections are you most interested in preserving and why?
All of them as far as format. I am not saying they can't be tweaked as far as placement, but reaching the state tournament should be an accomplishment. Upsets happen and that is part of the magic. To me a 2 class hockey tournament is far more fascinating than the bb and fb tournaments (5 and 6 classes respectively?) and it's because there's going to be some David and Goliath matchups. In FB for sure that will never happen again at the top level. In the first round this past season there was 1 upset in the first round out of 15 games - LS over CDH and not exactly a David over Goliath result. Perhaps in BB it's more frequent but I don't think so.

Grand Rapids' run a few years ago, Greenway this year, Holy Family upsetting Tonka in the section semis, Roseau won in '07 and made the semis in '08, etc.

And I say this as a fan of Tonka that has has some very, VERY good teams (5 seasons with between 19-24 wins) not reach state because they ran into Edina, Eden Prairie or BSM.

I'd be ok taking the Top 2 in each section with the winner gaining a higher seed regardless of record (call it an adjusted PWR) and then there would be a 16 team tournament, or a 1-class tournament consisting of the 8A section winners and 8AA section winners seeded accordingly. Although that becomes difficilut in many ways as several A teams won't have very many games played against AA opponents.

However I am all in favor of leaving well enough alone. Any format change is not going to please everyone and we could be trying to fix something that really isn't broken in the first place.
I don't think seeding would be the problem, but having a number 1 seed like Edina putting number 16 seed New Ulm into running time in the first period. Almost every year it would become just a AA tournament after the first round.
Forecheck, Backcheck, Paycheck

bodyup88
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by bodyup88 » Tue Mar 26, 2019 9:30 am

Hey, what do you think of the NCAA Men's D1 hockey brackets? Pretty cool that three Minnesota universities are number 1 seeds in their regions. Maybe some folks in New England are pissed off because they feel that these teams should all be in a western bracket, just like it always has been.
The same principle applies to high school hockey IMO. Get rid of the arbitrary sections and seed the teams. How much time and energy do we waste waiting with baited breath to see what the new sections look like? Raise your hand if you truly believe the administrators in Brooklyn Center are the best positioned to make those decisions on behalf of the Minnesota hockey community. If you want the strongest tournament, why wouldn't you want the best teams? There is still plenty of opportunity for upsets and great stories without the need for sections to get them. Look at Air Force beating St. Cloud in hockey last spring. How about Loyola Chicago in basketball last season getting to the final four?

I'm in favor of keeping the tournament a two class affair. It's never going back to one class no matter how much nostalgists pine for that. When football has seven classes and basketball has four, you'll never get the high school league to go back to one. I really believe it's probably in jeopardy of going to three classes at some point. The charge should be to figure out a way to make the existing two class tournament as good as you possibly can.

jeffpv
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by jeffpv » Tue Mar 26, 2019 1:27 pm

I like the idea of having eight section winners and eight from the polls in a 16-team tourney. I think it would go over very well.

zooomx
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by zooomx » Wed Mar 27, 2019 12:06 am

bodyup88 wrote:
Tue Mar 26, 2019 9:30 am
Hey, what do you think of the NCAA Men's D1 hockey brackets? Pretty cool that three Minnesota universities are number 1 seeds in their regions. Maybe some folks in New England are pissed off because they feel that these teams should all be in a western bracket, just like it always has been.
The same principle applies to high school hockey IMO. Get rid of the arbitrary sections and seed the teams. How much time and energy do we waste waiting with baited breath to see what the new sections look like? Raise your hand if you truly believe the administrators in Brooklyn Center are the best positioned to make those decisions on behalf of the Minnesota hockey community. If you want the strongest tournament, why wouldn't you want the best teams? There is still plenty of opportunity for upsets and great stories without the need for sections to get them. Look at Air Force beating St. Cloud in hockey last spring. How about Loyola Chicago in basketball last season getting to the final four?

I'm in favor of keeping the tournament a two class affair. It's never going back to one class no matter how much nostalgists pine for that. When football has seven classes and basketball has four, you'll never get the high school league to go back to one. I really believe it's probably in jeopardy of going to three classes at some point. The charge should be to figure out a way to make the existing two class tournament as good as you possibly can.
Let me guess. Your team was the second best team in a section with a really good team. Yawn... to compare college sports to high school sports is ridonkulous, but.. but ... but... lets talk college hockey. If Colorado College had beaten SCSU and UMD, then they would have made the national tournament... even though they were not a top 16 team. GTFOI!

Section 8 guy
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by Section 8 guy » Wed Mar 27, 2019 2:01 am

Isn’t the primary complaint that most of the posters that have been posting about format changes have in the first place that they feel like the same teams are always there? If so, wouldn’t eliminating sections only make that primary complaint even worse than it is now?

BobSaget
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by BobSaget » Wed Mar 27, 2019 3:07 am

bodyup88 wrote:
Tue Mar 26, 2019 9:30 am
If you want the strongest tournament, why wouldn't you want the best teams? There is still plenty of opportunity for upsets and great stories without the need for sections to get them. Look at Air Force beating St. Cloud in hockey last spring. How about Loyola Chicago in basketball last season getting to the final four?
I don't think the two examples you provided support your point. Literally, both Air Force and Loyola only made last year's NCAA tourney by winning their respective conference tournament.

mnpuckster
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by mnpuckster » Wed Mar 27, 2019 10:04 am

All these ideas seem like a great way to ruin the best HS tournament in the country!

yesiplayedhockey
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by yesiplayedhockey » Wed Mar 27, 2019 10:33 am

I think what some people are saying (or thinking) is this

Is there a way to extend this great tournament out another week or two (or should they????)

Even for us puckheads, the NCAA basketball tournament is heavily watched, sponsored and most people feel it is one of the premier sporting events of the year. But would it be if say they went straight to a final 8 team playoff and just eliminate the first couple rounds? I don't think it would. I know Vegas and CBS wouldn't be in favor of it

So could MN hockey come up with a similar format WITHOUT watering down the final 8 state tournament event? Maybe...maybe not... but it's sure worth discussing

Could they go to one class and come up with a format that starts with say 32 or 48 teams. Super Regional's held in historic arena's around the state.... a fair seeding process so that sure there could be a historic upset in the first round or two (say a Thief River Falls takes down Edina) but most of the times the best of the best still make it to Xcel

Right now some section games are historic (HF almost taking down Tonka two years ago) but most games played 2-3 weeks leading up to the state are boring and/or lopsided....I'd love to see a Minnetonka versus Greenway play in a sweet 16 game in the Grand Rapids arena... or Roseau versus Edina played up in Thief River falls unbelievable facility

So could Minnesota hockey go to a format similar to the qualifications and seeding process the NCAA basketball now uses and make our event better?

Slap Shot
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by Slap Shot » Wed Mar 27, 2019 12:52 pm

Interest in the NCAA BB tournament falls off for a lot of people after the first two rounds have been played, and suffice it to say a significant portion of the interest is generated by office pools, online pools, neighborhood pools, etc. Pool generated interest will never happen for this tournament regardless of format.

I could maybe see the following change and even then I think the current format would lose some luster:

16 teams. 1st round Wed, QF Thu, SF Saturday, F Sunday. But that becomes problematic for teams that have to travel, not sure anyone really wants to see the championship moved to a Sunday, there is no more Friday night duo of semi-final games which is often the best date of the tournament, etc.

Others might consider 16 teams 1st round Fri, QF Sat, the next week SF Friday, F Saturday and the 2nd weekend might be ok, but I don't know it just doesn't feel right. Maybe I need to get off my own lawn.

yesiplayedhockey
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by yesiplayedhockey » Wed Mar 27, 2019 1:13 pm

No school events can happen on a Sunday (at least that use to be the rule)

First weekend in March - 32 teams play in 4 arena's pre chosen a year in advance - 4 games per sight (2 Friday/ 2 Saturday )

2nd weekend of March - Sweet 16 - 8 games played at 2 different pre-chosen arena's (2 Friday - 2 Saturday)..Little bigger arenas

State tournament as given

Seeding and selections could happen similar to the way the NCAA does it today..combo of best record in district, district playoff winner, rankings, etc etc

Example of one year could be

32 teams - 4 sights would be Grand Rapids, Parade, Roseau and Marshall
16 teams - 2 Sights would be Thief River Falls mini Ralph and Ridder
8 team - Xcel

yesiplayedhockey
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by yesiplayedhockey » Wed Mar 27, 2019 2:45 pm

Just having fun, this is what a 32 team format could look at. I simply merged in the top 20 AA teams with the top 12 A teams from the past year Let's play hockey rankings . Understand that this format may not make the best sense and folks smarter than me could come up with the exact formula. But it does show an interesting take on how things could play out. Again someone smarter than me (and with more time could figure out how the games were played if you took in each conference winner and combined them with some sort of ranking formula ..Neverless here you go


========================================================
North – Polaris Division – Roseau Arena

Edina (1) – Sartell (32)
BSM (16) – Totino Grace (17)
St Cloud Cath (9) – Roseau (24)
Duluth East (8) – Wayzata (25)

==========================================================
South – Schwans Division - Marshall Arena

St Thomas (4) – Warroad (29)
Mahtomedi (13) – Hill Murray (20)
Rosemount (12) – Alexandria (21)
Minnetonka (5) – Blake (28)

==========================================================

East – Essentia Health - Grand Rapids Arena

EP (2) – Orono (31)
Hermantown (15) – Chaska (18)
White Bear Lake (10) – Thief River Falls (23)
Maple Grove (7) – Eagan (26)

===========================================================

West – Target Corp – Parade Stadium

Blaine (3) – Delano (30)
Moorhead (14) – East Grand Forks (19)
Greenway (11) – Brainerd (22)
Andover (6) – Buffalo (27)

7TIMECHAMPS
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by 7TIMECHAMPS » Wed Mar 27, 2019 3:47 pm

yesiplayedhockey wrote:
Wed Mar 27, 2019 2:45 pm
Just having fun, this is what a 32 team format could look at. I simply merged in the top 20 AA teams with the top 12 A teams from the past year Let's play hockey rankings . Understand that this format may not make the best sense and folks smarter than me could come up with the exact formula. But it does show an interesting take on how things could play out. Again someone smarter than me (and with more time could figure out how the games were played if you took in each conference winner and combined them with some sort of ranking formula ..Neverless here you go


========================================================
North – Polaris Division – Roseau Arena

Edina (1) – Sartell (32)
BSM (16) – Totino Grace (17)
St Cloud Cath (9) – Roseau (24)
Duluth East (8) – Wayzata (25)

==========================================================
South – Schwans Division - Marshall Arena

St Thomas (4) – Warroad (29)
Mahtomedi (13) – Hill Murray (20)
Rosemount (12) – Alexandria (21)
Minnetonka (5) – Blake (28)

==========================================================

East – Essentia Health - Grand Rapids Arena

EP (2) – Orono (31)
Hermantown (15) – Chaska (18)
White Bear Lake (10) – Thief River Falls (23)
Maple Grove (7) – Eagan (26)

===========================================================

West – Target Corp – Parade Stadium

Blaine (3) – Delano (30)
Moorhead (14) – East Grand Forks (19)
Greenway (11) – Brainerd (22)
Andover (6) – Buffalo (27)
First thing that comes to mind here is the major class bias. (See Greenway 11/Brainerd 22) I think a lot of the big schools would oppose this for that reason. Also smaller schools that have opted up would have incentive to opt back down. Better seed/chance of getting in the tournament. If you seed 1-32 using Pagestat the only A schools that make it are Hermantown, SCC, and Mahtomedi. Of course this brings the same problems that people have with the one class system (One could argue those three schools don't represent the spirit of class A).

If we feel that more teams are needed at state to mix things up the best solution is to expand the tournament to 16 teams. Either 2 teams from each section or the 8 section champions and the next 8 according to pagestat. I think there is enough depth at least on the AA side to make this work. Another solution might be to add a section 9 and 10 and make two 4 team tournaments out of the section runner ups. People would have to realize that this increases the odds of blowouts in the first round. Especially in A.

To be honest I don't know that we ever get the magic of the one class tournament back. Every once in a while there might be a small town team that can make a AA run still but the odds of doing that just aren't what they used to be. There isn't enough of a chance for them to take the risk and opt up. The major factors for developing hockey are money, population, ice availability, and tradition. The ice availability advantage for out state has diminished as more arenas have been built and kids play year round. At the same time the population gap has widened. The way I see it is 3 of the 4 or maybe 4 of the 4 are trending the wrong way. This might just be the new reality and the only way to get some more flavor is to expand the field. At the risk of watering it down again.

I don't think 3 class is the answer. That makes it more boring to me.

Section 8 guy
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by Section 8 guy » Wed Mar 27, 2019 4:29 pm

The much easier version of this is to just make the section finals into a much bigger deal than they are now and hold them the weekend prior, prep bowl style. 4 Friday. 4 Saturday. Televise all of them statewide. Wham! 16 team state tournaments.

bodyup88
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by bodyup88 » Wed Mar 27, 2019 4:32 pm

Wow, getting a little raw out there. Must've touched a nerve somewhere. Everything OK out there in Douglas County Zx? How dare anyone use a college tourney to illustrate a point. Didn't see that anywhere on the board by-laws. Make sure all of the other posters get the same memo. BTW, I neither have a horse in the race nor a dog in the fight.

To clarify my take: I am in favor of a two-class hockey tournament just as we have now and I want to see the tourneys be as attractive as possible. A one-class tourney is not realistic and is simply never going to happen again. However, let's get rid of the AA sections assigned arbitrarily from Brooklyn Center and simply seed the field 1-64. Play 3 games to get to the 8-team state tourney, just as we do now. First 2 games at high seeds and section finals at neutral sites. And use big venues like Ridder, Aldrich, AMSOIL. If you can agree on Olympic ice use Mariucci, if not don't use it. But please, no more section finals at Roseville. Consider Friday nights and Saturday double headers. Currently, some sections play one round at high seeds, some play two rounds, some play all games at neutral sites, and one section pulls down a few banners and calls it a neutral site even though it's the home rink for one of the teams, complete with fully refurbished home locker room.

Section 1 has evolved to the point that it has run through Lakeville 9 of the past 10 years, only disrupted by Farmington in 2016. If the tourney were seeded that still may have been the case but I highly doubt it. I'm sure North would still have had their run from 2013-2015 with the Poehling brothers, Sadek, McNeely et al. but I'm not sure there would have been 9 Lakeville appearances. I know the argument is that we need geographic representation but, come on, Lakeville is 29 miles from the X.

Sections 2AA - 6AA have become so fluid that there are really no traditional rivalries or continuity. For example, as recently as 2014 Edina came out of 2AA and Eden Prairie out of 6AA. When Benilde won it all in 2012 they came out of 6AA while Edina was still in 2AA. In 2007, Woodbury came out of 2AA, Hill-Murray 3AA, Blaine from 4AA and Burnsville 5AA. All four of them are in different sections now. Ryan McDonagh-led Cretin won the state title in 2006 from Section 2AA. Three years later they were back representing 3AA and now they're in 6AA. The point in all of this is that it seems like metro teams keep getting moved around at the whim of the high school league. Is there perhaps a better way to run this tourney?

The area where there is probably the most passion is the northern sections. Like many people, I love to see northern teams in the state tourney. From 1945-1968 the champion either came from northern MN or St. Paul Johnson. Not until Edina won in 1969 did a suburban metro school win the tourney. 12 years later Jefferson became the second suburban school to win a state title in 1981 and the run was on. Since that first Jaguar title there have been seven northern titles in the last 39 years, won by Roseau three times and D East and Grand Rapids twice. Currently, there are eight AA teams more than 100 miles north of the X (Bemidji, Brainerd, C-E_C, D East, D Marshall, Grand Rapids, Moorhead and Roseau) and they are evenly divided between sections 7AA and 8AA. The question is what to do with these teams. Do you a) under the guise of travel and logistics, make one northern section? b) keep two hybrid northern/metro sections where, like many years, you could get two northern teams or the possibility of Andover and STMA? or c) throw everyone in the 64 team bracket and see what happens? Some years you might not have any northern teams and some years maybe you get Grand Rapids, the Rams and the Greyhounds. Who knows? Bottom line is that nothing happens without the coaches getting involved, irrespective who wants what in these rooms.

Section 8 guy
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Re: New State Tournament Format (or my day dream)

Post by Section 8 guy » Wed Mar 27, 2019 9:35 pm

Honest question. Is anyone aware of high school state tournaments anywhere that don’t have a geographic component to them? Isn’t it likely this is just how high school sports are handled everywhere? They are by definition called “state” tournaments.

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