Several years ago when I was a high school athletic director, I worked as a GHSA region secretary and a GHSA Executive Committee member. I held those positions for more than a dozen years and was honored to represent the school principals, coaches, athletes, parents, and fans of the regions that elected me. During and since that time, I've seen GHSA struggle through the expansion of championship classifications, a multiplier for private schools, and a variety of other travel/economic concerns related to re-classification and geographic region assignments.
During the greatest portion of my time with GHSA, I was also a Georgia representative with NIAAA's leadership training program. (National Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Association with the National Federation of High Schools -- the national sanctioning and rules authority for high school athletics in the U.S.) That experience placed me with athletic directors and state athletic association leaders from all across the nation. As a result, I had an opportunity to share Georgia's issues and concerns and listen to athletic leaders from every state. Leaning on the information others shared, I once proposed to the GHSA Executive Committee a plan for dealing with many of the re-classification issues mentioned earlier. My proposal was made more than ten years ago and was not popular with the leaders of the committee. It met immediate resistance and quickly died for lack of support. I still believe a version of that proposal holds merit and its time has come.
My proposal, years ago, was to eliminate regions. Allow every school to schedule the way they see fit in each sport, and adopt a computerized-interlocking schedule formula to create the end-of-season state playoff pairings. The GHSA office could assign small "schedule requirement groups" to require schools within limited travel distance from one another and in the same classification to play one another in each sport. This should help relieve the argument,"Nobody wants to play us."
Every travel concern argument I ever heard was about required region games, loss of classroom time, and the economic impact on a school. The 'unspoken', underlying complaint was about competitive balance (i.e., too many strong teams in a given sport (usually football) assigned together.) I rarely -- if ever -- heard a school complain about travel for a state playoff contest. They were happy and excited to be in the playoffs! There were also arguments about the imbalance in size of assigned regions (equal access to state playoff spots). Without regions, all schools have equal access and can schedule locally or statewide if it best meets their program's financial standing and/or needs. Schools would have to understand -- in such a format -- that scheduling would be extremely important regarding qualification for the state playoffs or playoff seeding.
Every travel concern argument I ever heard was about required region games, loss of classroom time, and the economic impact on a school. The 'unspoken', underlying complaint was about competitive balance (i.e., too many strong teams in a given sport (usually football) assigned together.) I rarely -- if ever -- heard a school complain about travel for a state playoff contest. They were happy and excited to be in the playoffs! There were also arguments about the imbalance in size of assigned regions (equal access to state playoff spots). Without regions, all schools have equal access and can schedule locally or statewide if it best meets their program's financial standing and/or needs. Schools would have to understand -- in such a format -- that scheduling would be extremely important regarding qualification for the state playoffs or playoff seeding.
The old guard of GHSA has always been "married" to 8 geographic regions in each classification and the pre-set playoff brackets that system creates. (Yes, I know there have been some changes/acceptance in recent years in Class A, but not in other classifications.) There has also been a mistrust of any seeding formula. If the highest level of NCAA football can utilize computers to assist their national championship selections, then why not GHSA?
The freedom of scheduling would allow GHSA to host some Saturday "Showcase" events using corporate sponsorship, television, and regional stadiums/arenas (maybe even college facilities) to enable profitable events that "interlock" schedules across the state during the regular season. For example, imagine football or basketball events -- similar to the Georgia Dome finals -- scattered throughout the regular season where high profile programs from wider geographic areas face off. These events would improve the "interlocking" portion of schedules and ratings. They would strengthen the seeding process. Meanwhile, programs trying to build or repair would have the opportunity to play one another more often.
Quality computerized ratings programs would make sure those programs competing at higher levels against stronger competition would be rewarded come state playoff time. Even "reasonable losses" against stronger competition would be rewarded at a greater rate than wins against weaker competition. If there is not a single computer ratings program that is trusted for seeding, use an average of multiple systems like the BCS does. I'm sure this state has sports-minded math experts that can create a formula that meets the criteria GHSA may require for playoff seeding. The state could also adopt Massey, Sagarin, or any of the many other systems already developed. Some of these are already being used by other states for playoff seeding. As long as the rating system only uses data for the existing season (no historical standing/rating), then I am confident the seeding would not miss a true potential state champion when it seeds the Top 32 for each classification. With all the current classifications consisting of less than 75 schools each, we are already placing almost fifty percent of teams in the state playoffs. That would not need to change, but the 32 best rated teams would make the playoffs instead of four from each region.
Schools could still form leagues/conferences with geographic proximity. They could still compete for "local" or "regional" championships. These leagues would just have to build their championship formats within the overall schedule limits established by GHSA. There would be the added bonus, however, of longevity. Leagues would not have to change every two years. They could become long standing and even include schools from more than one of GHSA's classifications. Once the GHSA state playoffs begin, schools would compete for a state title against just the schools within their own classification. These leagues would likely remain small, but would potentially include great traditional rivalries despite volatile classification assignments based on growing or shrinking enrollments.
I can also envision a huge media event resulting from the seeding results. Imagine a TV show that reveals the GHSA state playoff pairings for football and basketball. For our state, it would be similar to the Sunday Selection Show produced by the NCAA hoops tourney. Other sports' brackets could be revealed and marketed with online streaming broadcasts.
Is this the perfect ultimate answer? Maybe not. It does, however, provide an answer to many of the complaints we hear every two years during re-classification and the assignment of geographic regions. It also allows schools to decide their own schedules based on their level of success in each sport and their specific travel/economic concerns.
I welcome your questions and comments.
