May 19, 2016
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THE WIZARDRY OF OS
Assistant Basketball Coach and Head Swimming Coach at Central High School
The NCAA Baseball Tournament Selection Committee is going to have a problem. Well, let me rephrase that. The NCAA Baseball Tournament Selection Committee is going to have a problem if they don’t award regional sites and seeding based on achievement.
For those not paying attention, the SEC has 6 of the top 10 teams in the RPI. The other 4 in top 10 are from the ACC. The Big 10 does not have an Indiana or Illinois from that past few years that has been a top 5 team. As a matter of fact, you have to go all the way to #36 Michigan to find the first Big 10 team.
The Pac 12 isn’t helping the committee either. Arizona, at #23, is the highest rated Pac 12 team according to the RPI with Arizona State down at #34 as the next highest team.
The Big 12
I mean 9
I mean… whatever they are has Texas Tech coming strong at #11. Then 12 through 15 are all ACC teams. After some great seasons TCU is down at #20, while Oklahoma State at #25 is the only other school from this conference in the Top 30.
I don’t have the time to do the research, but I am guessing there has never been another year where the top teams in college baseball are as concentrated in the Southeast as there are this year. With Southern Miss, ULL, and Coastal Carolina filling in spots between ACC and SEC in the top 20, you have to scroll down to #21 UC Santa Barbara to find the highest ranked school west of Texas!!
As a matter of fact, UC Santa Barbara, Arizona, Arizona State, Cal-State Fullerton, Michigan, and Gonzaga need special recognition as the only schools in the top 40 from the North or West. Louisiana has 5 teams in the top 40 (LSU, Tulane, ULL, SLU, and Northwestern).
Of course, we still have a weekend of the regular season and conference tournament games to be played. Yet, it is pretty obvious that none of these other schools can make a big jump because they are playing conference teams that will not help their RPI.
Consequently, the committee is in a bind. They will have to choose between having the most regionalized NCAA Baseball Tournament ever, or make up some crazy excuse to spread the tournament to the North and West.
The good news is the Softball Committee already faced this issue and decided to simply award achievement. The SEC is hosting 9 of the 16 regionals this weekend. As cover though, Michigan, Oregon, Washington, and UCLA are a few of the other sites that help spread the tournament slightly.
The Baseball Committee has no such luck. Based on all the factors that the committees have used in past years, the SEC should host 7 regionals and the ACC should host 7 regionals. The other two regional hosts should be Coastal Carolina and Texas Tech. With two weeks left before selections are made, there can be some movement, but that would most likely involve ULL, Georgia Tech, or Southern Miss earning a host site.
The only hope for the committee is for Arizona to win the Pac 12 tour… wait, no, the Pac 12 does not have a conference tournament. Meanwhile, Utah is currently in first with a 15-9 conference record but a 20-25 overall record. Yikes! For the record, Arizona is presently in third. If you are like me, you are wondering what happened to Cal who took Texas A&M to what seemed like 30 innings last year in the College Station regional. The Bears are in the middle of the pac(k). They went 7-12 from April 5 to May 8 with only one non-conference game during the stretch. Tikes again!
I am sure there will be hand ringing and belly aching from all over. Change the rules! Push the season back! Yada yada yada. They have made changes and this is where we are this year. It is an odd year, and let’s enjoy the post season.
BY DENNIS DEARIE
VETERAN LOUISIANA HS REFEREE
This past week I felt honored to be able to sit down with a couple of “old” football coaches and listen to them tell a few of their favorite war stories. Most of the stories had changed a little since the last time they told ‘em. But some of the stories stayed close to the truth since I’d either been on the field working the game or had secured a VHS tape of the game. Back some twenty to thirty years ago I found most coaches in the Baton Rouge area happy to share a tape (since it was being used to learn us officials how to do our jobs as the coaches wanted us to do our jobs).
I knew this impromptu meeting wouldn’t last long so when I saw my chance I had to ask them the one question I’ve been asking coaches for more than ten years now “What in your opinion is the major reason for the decline or lack of respect between coaches and officials on Friday nights”. Before I could finish asking my question I was asked “do you mean the things not being addressed”?
To be honest I didn’t expect any of the coaches to answer me with a question so I just hurriedly answered “yes, what do y’all think is the 800 pound gorilla that nobody seems to want to acknowledge and confirm that there certainly is a problem between coaches and the officials on any given Friday night”. As they hesitated I repeated that under no conditions will I ever name names, etc. and it felt like an eternity before one coach that I’ve known nearly 30 years piped up and said “the year before I retired we were one game ahead in district with just one game to go. My quarterback rolled out and threw a pass downfield to a wide open kid that caught it and he wasn’t going to be touched. As I’m watching this clinching TD I see one last player that could get to him. But my guy zigged and wasn’t going to be caught when another kid dove at him, reached out and grabbed the facemask and jerked my guy down. The ball comes out as his neck was almost turned all the way around. I hear whistles being blown and waited for at least two flags to be thrown but the guy watching all this happen says it’s a fumble and we don’t get the ball or a penalty. We’re told he fumbled and not one of your guys called the facemask”.
He continued “I had to get all my coaches calmed down and off the field before I could ask for a conference with the white hat. He didn’t want to talk to me and he just asked the guy who called it a fumble what happened and then signals that we’re now gonna be on defense. I asked my side official to tell the ref I had to talk to him BEFORE the ball goes over. He did but I’m told by the official covering deep plays to get off the field or he was going to flag me”!
He added “I then tried to keep control and begged him to get the white hat so I could ask what was going on and why no facemask was called. Instead of hustling over to my sideline the white hat did his best Sunday afternoon stroll and tells me there’s nothing he can do since he was so far away and none of the other officials saw a facemask”. Then all of a sudden the umpire walks over to me and says “Hey coach, we’ve got to get the game going it’s getting late”! “I’ll never forget that guy, I went ballistic, he was on the other end of the field and he says we’ve got to get the game restarted? I found out this guy was only in his third year and he was working a district title game? There’s something very wrong with this whole situation”.
He continued that he feels today’s officials have no respect for the coaches. And I know many officials that fit that description just as I know many coaches don’t have an ounce of respect for the officials. To me the lack of common respect between coaches and officials at the high school level has spoiled the atmosphere on Friday nights.
When I restarted my officiating career I noticed this common dislike among coaches and officials was as real as it can be. I made a motion at a meeting to invite coaches to sit down and explain what they feel is needed and what they feel has been lost in getting and keeping good officials. To my horror my motion failed as one member got up and said “Coaches are only looking for somebody to cheat for them. We don’t need ‘em in our meetings”!
If ever there was a need that isn’t being shared it’s the one between high school coaches and the officials that work their games. When coaches and officials move up to the professional ranks I can agree with that fellow official in some cases but we must always remember that high school sports and players are out there because they love the game and need everyone’s help to become better players. Its past time for everyone involved in high school sports to work together and not against each other.
(Coach, I know I didn’t get every word correct but the lesson should be easy for everyone to learn what you exactly wanted to say. Thanks for your approval to quote you in my column, it’s coaches like you that we so desperately need.)
Till next week…
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