For nearly two decades I have been calling for the Michigan High School Athletic Association to seed its postseason tournaments.

Finally, a few years back the MHSAA decided to seed the state wrestling finals beginning with the quarterfinal round.

That is not good enough.

Too many times in my 30-plus years as a sportswriter I have seen the best two teams in the field play the first night.

It does not matter what sport it is.

In boys and girls basketball it happens far too often. The blind draw that is used to selected the pairings is just not good enough anymore.

In baseball and softball I have seen the best two teams play in the pre-district round. That meant that the winner was pretty much guaranteed a spot in the regional round of the state playoffs.

It will happen again Monday night when visiting Brandywine faces host Watervliet in the opening round of the Class C girls district tournament.

The winner of this game is more than likely going to win the distict championship and move onto the regionals.

I have heard all the excuses.

It is too tough to seed the teams.

My solution is to have the athletic directors from each of the participating schools and a local sports writer get together and seed the tournament.

Create criteria that includes head-to-head, common opponents and strength of schedule.

I would be more than happy to help seed local tournaments and I am sure my colleagues would be as well.

You can vote on whether or not you agree with seeding the postseason tournaments at leaderpub.com. The results will appear in next Tuesday’s paper.

 

Scott Novak is sports editor for Leader publications. He can be reached at scott.novak@leaderpub.com.