Changes to playoff format have pros, cons, confusion

The stands were packed Tuesday at the Neelyville High School gym with the Tigers hosting a district semifinal against Naylor.

In any other year, the two schools located seven miles apart would have had a 120-mile roundtrip bus ride to play each other.

Instead of the two semifinal games at one location, top-seeded Ellington hosted Van Buren while Naylor had a shorter drive down Highway 148 to play the Tigers.

“Great, great atmosphere,” said Naylor coach Logan Foster.

Neelyville and Ellington fans showed up in force Thursday night at Van Buren for the championship game, which the Whippets won 60-55.

“We love the support and we appreciate our community so much,” Neelyville senior Makenzie Davis said of the crowd. “We had a huge support system and I’m so thankful for that.”

Van Buren and Ellington squared off Monday in a boys semifinal that also featured a big crowd and a wild finish worth the price of admission.

It will be interesting to see what the attendance numbers were like around the state for those games considering we’re in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic.

That’s exactly why this is not like any other year and the MSHSAA basketball playoffs have a different configuration and feel.

Higher seeds are hosting district quarterfinal and semifinal games while member schools will be the site of sectional and quarterfinal playoffs instead of the traditional, predetermined neutral gyms.

The change is also a blessing for a Mules team that had three of its seven home dates canceled.

“For us to not to have to drive to St. Louis for a game, that’s always nice,” Mules coach William Durden said. “It has it’s pros and cons.”

Poplar Bluff’s boys will host Seckman at 6 p.m. Tuesday while the girls will be playing at the same time in Jackson against the top seed. The district championship game will be held at Northwest High School in Cedar Hill on Thursday. The girls tip off at 6 p.m. followed at 7:30 p.m. by the boys.

Durden said not being able to see the other semifinal to scout an opponent for the final is not that big of a deal.

“With our district, we’ve seen these guys multiple times, whether it’s on video or in person,” Durden said. “We got a good feel of what all the teams do. More worried about what we’re going to do.”

The toughest question for fans might be figuring out where to go to see the games.

Basketball has enjoyed a set of locations for the state playoffs — Three Rivers College, Van Buren, Dexter, Sikeston, Farmington among others — unlike other sports.

The semifinals and finals will still be held at Missouri State University in Springfield, but the road to get there will be confusing.

In odd-numbered years, like 2021, the odd-number district champions would host the sectional playoff while the quarterfinal is hosted by the team that did not host the previous round, or if both hosted, the team on the top of the bracket. In even-numbered years it flips to even-numbered districts and the team on the bottom bracket in the quarterfinal.

In the cases of Twin Rivers and Holcomb, the girls District 1 champions in Class 3 and Class 2 respectively, both schools hosted the district championship game. Does that keep them from hosting the sectional?

“Yes, hosting the district final is part of the deciding criteria,” wrote Jason West, communications director for MSHSAA in an email.

“If both teams If both teams hosted the same number of games during the district tournament, the sectional host will be the team that did not host the district championship game. If neither team hosted the district title game, or they both hosted it, then the sectional host will be the team from the odd-numbered district.”

There are other parts of the criteria to consider, including the size of a host school’s gym and any restrictions placed on capacity due to the virus.

Ticketing for the sectional and quarterfinal playoffs will also change with spectators needing to purchase a digital ticket. West said that each school will receive a number of digital tickets, “equal to half of the capacity for the host site.”

The MSHSAA website, mshsaa.org, has a link to purchase tickets ($7 for sectional and quarterfinal games), and each school will have instructions for fans. No tickets will be sold at the door.

MSHSAA is also expanding online broadcasts, for a fee.

One drawback to the change has been our ability to cover the entire tournament and having to choose which games will be more newsworthy. Seeding helps, but upsets are hard to predict.

Of the eight small-school districts in Southeast Missouri this past week, there were 10 upsets in which the higher seed lost during a quarterfinal or semifinal. Last year there were also 10 upsets, but they were even between boys and girls while this season there was only one on the girls side.

That could have something to do with playing at home, teams being over or under seeded or the fact that area teams were shut down for a week heading into the playoffs after a snowstorm.

Another aspect of the postseason change that should get considered for the future is hosting boys and girls playoff games on different days. The sectional will feature boys playing Tuesday night and the girls on Wednesday with 6 p.m. tipoff.

Some districts also held the finals on separate days while others continued the tradition of the doubleheader. Twin bills can save money when renting out large venues, but it can kind of take away the celebratory atmosphere for the first-game winner and delay the start of the second game.

The postseason is a special time and while this one looks and feels a little different, maybe MSHSAA can learn how to make it better for future seasons.

Or at least a little less confusing.