tournament expands

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SoCalHoops High School News

CIF Southern Section Expands Playoffs:
10 Wins Gets You In--(Jan. 28, 2000)

While the City Section is making things tougher for everyone to qualify for the 32 team "City Championship" tournament following the conclusion of the regular season, the Southern Section has decided to throw the doors wide open. Eric Sondheimer, LA Times staff writer and deputy prep sports editor, spoke yesterday with Hal Harkness, who has taken over as interim assistant commissioner in charge of basketball for Dr. Harold Cebrun, who resigned earlier this month, and Harkness announced that the CIF Southern Section will expand its playoff pools in order to accomodate the huge numbers of teams, particularly in Divisions I and V. In an article published in today's LA Times Valley Edition, Sondheimer quotes Harkness as saying that any team with at least 10 wins will now be eligible to gain entry to the playoffs simply by filing a petition with the Southern Section office. "If you petition and have 10 wins, we'll put you in the tournament," said Hal Harkness

Schools that don't automatically qualify for playoff berths based on league finish (top 2 in a four team league, top 3 in a five or six team league and top 4 in a seven or eight team league) must petition to enter the playoffs before 9 a.m. on Feb. 12. According to Sondheimer's story, "The decision to expand in all divisions was made because there are too many schools competing in Division I to limit the playoffs to a 32-team bracket. There are 142 girls' teams and 145 boys' teams in Division I." There are even more teams competing in Division V, which has 154 teams in both boys and girls.

The decision will affect schools like Montclair Prep, Pacific Hills and Campbell Hall, which compete in the crowded six team Delphic League. Given the competitiveness of the league (all three of those teams are currently ranked in the top 5 in Division V-AA), and with Crossroads, the No. 1 ranked team in Division IV-A, and the perennial favorite and current league leader, had playoff standings alone been used to determine entry into the playoffs, it was clear that one of the three others, MP, PH, or CH, might not make it unless an "at-large" berth opened up. Of course the decision to open the playoffs up means more games, more money for the schools and the CIF and more participation for everyone, so it's generally, at least in our view, a pretty good thing. This year, the top teams will be seeded into the 32 team bracket, but there will be enough "wild card" games preceding the first round in order to determine the remaining entries into the the 32-team brackets in Divisions I and V (and presumably in II, III and IV as well). Currently, at least according to Sondheimer's count, there are 32 boys' teams and 27 girls' teams from the region that have 10 victories and can petition to join the playoffs if they don't qualify.

The decision though was not met with universal praise. "Teams can clinch a playoff spot before they ever get to league," Keith Case, girls' coach at Notre Dame told Sondheimer. "It takes away the value of competing in league." In fact, that's a practice that teams used to employ when this format was used several years ago: A team can make the playoffs by scheduling "soft" teams just to get the minimum 10 wins. But by announcing the decision well into the league competition does somewhat cut across that argument. How this all shakes out on February 12 when the playoff brackets will be announced is something that a lot of us will be waiting for eagerly.