Tournament Formats

[ndlionsfan]

I've seen this mentioned on a couple other topics, so I figured I'd bring it to the front and get more people discussing it. What does everyone think about the current Class B postseason tournaments? Almost all the districts have a double elimination format with the top 4 teams going to regions, even tho a couple districts only have 6 teams total. Some have mentioned going to single elimination districts like Dist 3 did in 2003, but that only lasted one year. Others say do away with the districts and just have every team make the regional tourney, extend it to 4-5 days and play it with a single elimination format, even tho NDHSAA might disagree because of money generated at district tourneys. Anyone else have thoughts or ideas?

[football_lives_on]

keep it double elimination allowing 4 teams to regions
maybe include double elimination in regions too possibly

[BballFan1307]

keep it double elimination allowing 4 teams to regions
maybe include double elimination in regions too possibly

i would agree with double elmin in regions but theres not enough time, i think teams need that one week break before state.

[Stromer]

Get rid of the district tournament. Extend the regular season by three games instead. Start tournament play with the region tournament, and make it a 4-day tournament. You have to win to stay alive. If fewer than 16 teams exist in the region, give byes to the top seeds. It makes sense. All the district boundaries need to be redrawn anyway, so why not move to something sensible like this?

Would it be required that you play all region teams? Otherwise, seeding would be screwed up. I agree with you that the district tournament is just rehashing what was decided in the regular season. The only problem I could see would be seeding issues. Even if you play everyone once, I think ties would be very widespread. Another problem would be the days/sites needed to play it. You would either need 2 extra days to complete the 1st round making it a total of 5 or else you would have to uses 2 different sites in the 1st round and then you would end up with 4 days. SInce usually regional sites are based in the center of the region, I would lean towards option 1. Using 2 sites would involve long distances for travel.

[sportsguy2]

I like the way it's played right now...keep it the same

[Hinsa]

As I've said in other topics, I am a big supporter of single elimination tournaments. There is nothing like March Madness where if you lose your done, and if the underdog wins it really means something. There is no tournament more popular than the NCAA and it's because of "win or go home" and the longing for a Cinderella for everyone to jump on.

Double elim definitely helps to get the best teams to the next round, but who says you always have to have the best team advancing? That's the charm of tournaments - put up or shut up every night, win or go home.

[hoopsstar2391]

To me districts is like your conference tourney, and then the region tourney basically is a tourney of 64, with the exception of the 3rd and 4th place game at regionals. State is like your Final Four, but instead of four it's 8. I like the way they have it set up now. Double-elimination in the districts is a good thing i think, because it gives the best teams the chance to go to regionals.

[scruffy]

The districts will not go away. However, with the three class system now killed for good expect quite a bit of district reshuffling. The days of the six team districts will go away soon, and who knows we could go back to four regions like we had years ago. The top two teams from each region would qualify for the state tournament...

[ndlionsfan]

I don't like the idea of 4 regions with the top two going to state. Basically makes the region championship games meaningless. Yeah, they would help get a better seed, but when you make the championship teams will just have a big sigh of relief that they're already in state. There's nothing better than the current region championship games....you're so close to state you can taste it but if you lose its like the worst loss in the world. It's all do or die basically...

[ndlionsfan]

Looking at the NDHSAA website, I really don't see how redistricting is going to have any affect on the current tournament setups. In girls bball, there is only 1 district with 9 teams, 6 districts with 7, and 1 district with 6. In boys bball, there are 3 districts with 9 (all in the eastern part of the state), 5 districts with 7, and 2 districts with 6....with most of the last two in the western part of the state. No matter how they redraw the districts lines, you will still have many districts with 6-7 teams in both sports. The only way to get more districts teams is to have fewer districts (which I don't see how that could be possible) or just do away with districts all together and figure out something to have 8 super regionals. I think that could give class B a big boost and make tourney time even more exciting.

[hp fan]

I have to say I love the idea of single elim regional tournament. IF I were the NDHSAA here would be my plan:

1. Teams must play every team in their region. Get rid of the holiday tourneys/preseason tourneys (Teams play thier regional foes in these tourneys, then play them in reg. season, and then in march. I think 3 is an overkill.) This means that most teams would have 15 games scheduled.

2. Seed the Regional tournment (most 16 teams) based on regional record. Allow teams to play non-regional games of thier choice. If Hazen wants to play TLM instead of a cellar dweller, they should and not worry about ramifications of regional record. This keeps teams from playing cupcake games. The regionak tourney could be 4-5 days, 4 games a day with semis and champ. night having 2 games.

3. I would sponsor the Hoopster shootout and not count those games against a teams total. This would reward the quality programs for the hard work they put in.

4. This allows for teams to schedule 4 extra games. I heard on this site about some sort of ND/Minn shootout, with games all day and a 3pt contest and dunk contest. WOW what a great idea. I think that this would allow teams to use the 4 extra games to schedule how the see fit.

What a tourney it would be!!!!!!!!!!!!

3.

[poweraidman]

i really think it should stay the same as it is, there is no reason to get rid of districts.