Super Region

[WhiteMamba]

Super Region is the way I feel things have to go. It will be a transition for some but in the end it will probably be workable.

[B-oldtimer]

I think super region playoff format may need some tweaking too before this is done. I look at super regions and the philosophy of one and done as creating incentive to win may have bad effect on programs that have been down for number of years. Start looking at this on long term perspective say your program has been at bottom one third of region for several years you go to regional play in game at other teams home court and if you loose your out. So you loose like that several years in row so your kids in your program get one game and not at tournament site but at opposing team site. Your kids have zero experience of playing in tournament game and never even get to play in front of bigger crowd so its hard to sell young kids on going out to play basketball if looks just like another regular game and loose and season is over. I have seen this myself with schools if you ever have couple years of loosing it gets nearly impossible to climb out of that hole. I saw teams where we had good talent but have lost for number years that they lacked the confidence and knowledge how to win to get back even to regional.. These kids could win in other sports but not basketball so what I trying to say you may want to think of this more long term basis even though it seems like winner for getting down to exciting finish. Also like it has been now even if you lost your were at tournament game and if you like what you saw about team you might go on to regional to watch them and see how they would do. I think your going to loose even more fans because they won't see tournament experience of seeing number of different teams. I look at our region as it stands now there have been 4 teams that have been there at least 5 times straight if not even 10 times straight. There's at next level 4 teams have made it 80% of the time. Then remaining 6 teams it might be they have made it once out of 5 years and some never in 5 years. Do we want for number of these teams to be one and done scenario. I think all this is going to lead for more coops and soon we will be just like class A couple of dominant teams and rest trying to make run in regional tournament. I could be all wrong here but I have been thinking about this for while and reading the comments and it always from perspective of if you have been winning and seems like a waste of time to get to last couple of games. But my point is this what if your on loosing team and above scenario is the case and have done this several years what effect it has on the school and getting people to go out and compete think about it and I think this goes for different classes of basketball.

[winner-within]

You make a lot of good points Oldtimer....although I do think there are some towns and programs that do need to look hard at consolidation versus even co-op and the super region I actually think will help promote this....why be a team that (like you say) has been down for years....that team isnt a district team winner either and finishing last or second to the last at a district tournament does nothing for program esteem or player esteem either IMO....I do think that if the down team has a stud (which they generally do) then the district tourn gets him/her some exposure that is well deserved for a hard working player....but is not enough IMO to have a whole tournament for this....as the SR gets rolling down the road I think you will see more than just the 2 teams fans attending the play-in games also.......

[B-oldtimer]

I know we disagree on coops and consolidation but I am more of traditionalist than you. I look back at when I was in high school and I was looking at annual other day for some reason or another and I looked at basketball teams we had then and participation and it nothing like it is today. We had something like 30 some boys in high school and junior high and out that group only two didn't play basketball. I know for fact that was way it was for a lot of smaller schools around here they had great participation in the sports. We were never dominant team but we were over 500 to 600 winning percentage. I guess I liked idea that we had that kind of participation and whole community was into the basketball team and they followed the team and area teams quite closely. The community new who were players and the other players from neighboring towns and they followed how everyone was doing. Now there is nothing near like this participation of kids even in our smaller schools are down to less than 50% and community interest in basketball is even half what it used to be. This what i think of for participation and basketball wasn't as good as it today but teams were fairly balanced and people loved to watch it because it was there team and they knew who they were playing and it was fun to watch. Also when the season was over kids were done with basketball except for there own pickup games they played in town and they moved on to the next sport which was baseball.

Winner-within i look at Cavalier i see this has happened to you in baseball what i described about basketball. Cavalier had quite tradition of baseball winning three championships in early 2000 and they couple of really down years and then participation numbers until they didn't play one year and next year playing junior varsity schedule and now last year they cooped with Northborder. This pretty much case example about what i was describing in basketball if you ever fall off have few loosing seasons it gets really hard to reestablish yourself. In my mind if you large enough to field football team your large enough to field a baseball team. Same goes for Northborder and now you have a team neither community fully identifies with and follows like you had your own baseball team. I think we need to limit the length of seasons kids play one sport this includes traveling teams, camps, and open gyms because i believe this has hurt participation in all sports kids only have so much time if they are going participate in sports and now they may only choose one and if that doesn't work they quit sports all together.
I think this why we need to continue to look at keeping as many teams and communities we can or we loose what was special about North Dakota small town school sports. The class A model over the years has never caught on and for the most part following by fans been by schools participating in the tournament. So tear this reasoning apart but it how i feel and see what happening to class b sports.

[winner-within]

I think we are close to the same age I would say, and traditionalist is what I would describe myself as actually..
but I realize the changing times (not that you dont) but the days of old aren't coming back and I don't know your stance on co-ops but your example of cav baseball is what my stance is...which is becarfull the co-ops it may rob from the next sport....and theres Hockey getting more popular which really hurts ball ....I think competition in important to growth of a child, they will need it in the workforce later....but there is another reality in ND and that is we have 2 Div 1 university's now, along with serious recruiting from the other colleges from Lake Region to Williston to Minot etc etc and there are locals attending them which is awesome to see and the youngans behind them start dreaming too, so the focus on one sport may take over....I feel its not up to us 80's boys to bring back that era (because we couldn't even if we wanted to) and it definitely is not up to the current kids to...because they dont even what it was......I dont want to say "it is what it is"....I would go on to say "lets make the most of it" .....

[HammerTime]

So how do you propose we fix this problem? District tournaments, however important as they may be for the psyche of a team, are outdated. Co-ops appear the way North Dakota small towns will have to go. Consolidations, farther along the line, but inevitable for areas like Region 2, 3, and 4. Maybe we could split up tournaments into different sections. As ridiculous as this is going to sound, maybe we should make the State Tourney the Final Four. Then the four sections that sent the teams to the state tourney have a four team bracket. Then another group of sections where the sections groups of 8 or 6 or whatever to include all of the teams. Basically it would be setup like one big March Madness Tournament, where the matchup are predetermined before each tournament. If we want districts to actually matter (Yes, I know they have later postseason implications, but the biggest purpose of them are just extra games.), we need to make districts the bigger tournament and make the other ones smaller. I'm not sure. That's just one suggestion. Maybe next time we look at realignment, we should look at changing the whole system, not applying duct tape to minor cracks here and there.

[B-oldtimer]

I agree something needs to be done but powers to be are afraid of changing system because of time, media and money derived from that The politics of system now make it about impossible to change because these large class b schools like how the system works now. This will change when media comes and says there not as interested and will not pay the fee to the activities association to televise the games. This has been problem in changing system the media has had big say in what they will televise and time when they are played etc. The rural population decline also has been big factor too especially in central North Dakota especially in regions 3 and 4 and also neighboring regions touching these two regions. The rest of state has now seemed to have turned corner with oil boom and growth of large eastern cities. If it continues as is like Winner-within has said we will be looking at maybe half dozen coops or schools coming from these regions where average game travel will be 100 miles not ideal picture.
I think were getting closer each year because interest in the state tournament have been falling little each year. When we loose this revenue source or it reduced to where class b tournament doesn't generate the interest then powers that be will looking to change the system. Basketball tournaments are big thing for North Dakota activities it allows for generation of enough revenues to help fund all other activities in state of North Dakota directly or indirectly. I don't have solutions to this problems I think it is much larger problem for whole state to address and what they want to state to look like in the future. I know we can't go back to past but to me there must be some future for this part of the state too. We have resources, infrastructure, and area to build something new to attract businesses and people in the future.

[winner-within]

I dont see the SR concept format if you will as a broken system or lets say a less quality system then District tourns....obviously there has to be pros and cons to everything....with other regions jumping on board I see more pros than cons....

and with schools all over the state with only 40-50 kids in them there has to be plenty of revenue...

[HammerTime]

I dont see the SR concept format if you will as a broken system or lets say a less quality system then District tourns....obviously there has to be pros and cons to everything....with other regions jumping on board I see more pros than cons....

and with schools all over the state with only 40-50 kids in them there has to be plenty of revenue...

I never said Super Region was a broken system. It's interesting, and while it fixes some problems, it presents a few new challenges. What we need is to look at the system and come up with a plan that creates more pros than cons.

[Sticks11]

Like it was discussed on here before. I think it's a step in the right direction what those regions are doing right now. Say what you want about the district tournament, but in those regions with 14 or more teams, it works. I know a lot of people that love the district tournaments. I also know a lot that, even in Region 6, would like to see the super. I'm not really opposed to either one. I just wouldn't really like the super region format in a region with 16 teams.

[winner-within]

Region 1 & 3 have 7 in each district...with Region 1 moving to SR format next season

all the rest have 13 all of those are 6 in one dist. and 7 in the other

I honestly believe in the future that some super regions could be down to 11 maybe even 10 making it possible to maybe have no play in game per say.....

[yellowjacket]

Sorry winner, but you are incorrect. Region 6 has 7 teams in each district with two teams moving in next year. They will have 8 in each district which makes for a perfect double elimination district tournament.

[winner-within]

Sorry winner, but you are incorrect. Region 6 has 7 teams in each district with two teams moving in next year. They will have 8 in each district which makes for a perfect double elimination district tournament.

for a few years yes...and I think I had heard that sorry... but with that said it may not last for the next even 10 years if a neighboring region declines or consolidates or co-ops now you could have a realignment or restructure that changes the layout....its safe to say not many regions will gain schools other than the oilfield country....I could be wrong of course but NDakotas demographics are pretty predictable outside the Bakken...

[Hinsa]

Sorry winner, but you are incorrect. Region 6 has 7 teams in each district with two teams moving in next year. They will have 8 in each district which makes for a perfect double elimination district tournament.

It also makes for a very exciting single elimination tournament. Bring it every night or go home.

Why do we feel that teams need a second chance? If 8th seed beats 1 seed in the first round of a double elim district, it is still unlikely that 8 will be able to hold on to get to the regional. IMO, if 8 beats 1 they have earned their way into the regional.

[triplebbb]

In terms of the oil field gaining teams, the only one I've heard of is Alexander trying to get some programs going. I believe they have dissolved all co-ops with Watford City and are playing JH ball, looking in to 6 man Montana FB, etc. Haven't heard of any others.

[winner-within]

Looking for an answer

W L Pts. W L

what is Pts. referring to in the SR, and how does it work

its in the GF Herald today

[Run4Fun2009]

Looking for an answer

W L Pts. W L

what is Pts. referring to in the SR, and how does it work

its in the GF Herald today

Points are in reference to 2 point games.

Some teams play each other twice each counting as 1 point (or result)...some teams play each other only once (usually original D3 vs. D4 matchups happen only once).

So since this is boys BB topic I will use Griggs Cty Central's Record as an example they only play every Region team ONCE:
GCC 6-3 12-6 12-5 under the GF Herald example
**I do away with the first set of standings and just do the points part in my standings list**

I hope this helps a bit

[winner-within]

Looking for an answer

W L Pts. W L

what is Pts. referring to in the SR, and how does it work

its in the GF Herald today

Points are in reference to 2 point games.

Some teams play each other twice each counting as 1 point (or result)...some teams play each other only once (usually original D3 vs. D4 matchups happen only once).

So since this is boys BB topic I will use Griggs Cty Central's Record as an example they only play every Region team ONCE:
GCC 6-3 12-6 12-5 under the GF Herald example
**I do away with the first set of standings and just do the points part in my standings list**

I hope this helps a bit

so is it just the pts. category that determines where you sit for seeding purposes?

[Run4Fun2009]

Looking for an answer

W L Pts. W L

what is Pts. referring to in the SR, and how does it work

its in the GF Herald today

Points are in reference to 2 point games.

Some teams play each other twice each counting as 1 point (or result)...some teams play each other only once (usually original D3 vs. D4 matchups happen only once).

So since this is boys BB topic I will use Griggs Cty Central's Record as an example they only play every Region team ONCE:
GCC 6-3 12-6 12-5 under the GF Herald example
**I do away with the first set of standings and just do the points part in my standings list**

I hope this helps a bit

so is it just the pts. category that determines where you sit for seeding purposes?

Yeah in the end that's the region record...this way all teams will have 24 'games' played even though they may only play 12 region games...some D4 teams play 17 games among region opponents. It really depends on the non-region games played by some teams on how they schedule their in-region games.

If you look here you'll see that I just use the points column and list in order of "W & L" in the standings to lessen the confusion of more records listed: viewtopic.php?f=83&t=12496

[yellowjacket]

Sorry winner, but you are incorrect. Region 6 has 7 teams in each district with two teams moving in next year. They will have 8 in each district which makes for a perfect double elimination district tournament.

It also makes for a very exciting single elimination tournament. Bring it every night or go home.

Why do we feel that teams need a second chance? If 8th seed beats 1 seed in the first round of a double elim district, it is still unlikely that 8 will be able to hold on to get to the regional. IMO, if 8 beats 1 they have earned their way into the regional.

I think the main reason we have double elimination district tournaments is to generate more income. You have 9 games over three days instead of 6. It keeps more teams involved over the coarse of three days, thus more fans attending. I kind of liked the challenge game system used in the past, that we if you did have a 8 upset a 1 the 8 would still likely advance since the 1 and 8 wouldn't be able to play again.