Ramblings 72

October 29, 2002

by Marshal Manlove, Editor, Creator of Words, Gallivanter 

It’s tournament time and I’ve managed to skate through with just two articles so far this season. But that’s ok, because after all, too much of a good thing is not good.

But it’s tournament time and time to crack down and share the following information about tournament qualifying. Please remember that when we take a look at who currently qualifies, it will be a rough estimate, for the most part, because I don’t have all of the results from each team. This is just a guide for now.
The qualifications listed below are from the DIAA tournament handbook. The excerpts are the basic clauses that are necessary to this conversation.

Field Hockey

A-The Tournament field will be comprised of the six conference champions and 10 at-large teams.
C- Selection of At-Large Teams

1. At-Large teams will be selected according to their combined win-loss percentage as determined by the following procedure:

b-The following point system will be used to determine both at –large team’s overall win-loss percentage and their opponents overall win-loss percentage.

3 points for a win, 1 point for a tie, 0 points for a loss Divide Total Possible Points into Total Accumulated Points to determine percentage.

c- The opponents overall win-loss percentages are added together and divided by the number of opponents to determine the opponents average win-loss percentage. Opponents played twice are counted twice.

d- The opponents average win-loss percentage is added to the at-large teams overall win-loss percentage and divided in half to determine their Combined Win-Loss Percentage HOLY SMOKES I CANNOT FOLLOW ALL OF THIS NONSENSE.

e- If two teams are tied for the last at-large berth, the Committee will use the following tie-breaking criteria:

1. The winner of the regular season game between the two teams will qualify for the tournament.
2. If the teams split of did not play during the regular season, the Committee will conduct a playoff to determine which team will qualify for the tournament.

D- Seeding for the Bracket Placement
1- All of the qualifying teams will be seeded using the at-large selection procedure described above and placed into a bracket accordingly.

Ok, so as far as I can tell right now this would mean that the following teams may be qualifying for the tournament. But I'm not totally sure because I fell asleep typing all of that.
Brandywine, Concord, Cape Henlopen, Friends, St. Marks, Delmar are your likely, if not already, Conference champions. The 10 at-large teams look like William Penn, A.I. duPont, Caesar Rodney, Archmere, Caravel, Wilmington Christian, Lake Forest, Tower Hill, Sanford, and either Dover, Seaford or Smyrna based on that complicated math above. There is no telling what the seeding would be at this point, but as of this writing, Cape Henlopen would be your number one seed.

The Boys Soccer tournament field will be comprised of the Blue Hen Flight A and B champions, the Henlopen North and South Champions, the Independent Champion, the Diamond State Conference Champion, the non-conference team with the highest winning percentage and 9 at-large teams.

Without going through all of the extended mumbo-jumbo from above, the at-large teams are determined by figuring out a formula, which basically goes like this….
3 points for a win, 1 point for a tie, 0 points for a loss. Add the points together and divide by the number of opponents to get the winning percentage. Teams played twice are counted twice. The opponents’ win-loss percentage is then added to the at-large teams’ percentage and divided in half to determine their combined win-loss percentage. Divide that in half to get the combined win-loss percentage. The top nine highest totals comprise the balance of the state tournament field. There are all sorts of procedures for breaking ties.

As the teams stand right now, here is what the tournament field might look like beginning November 5.
Middletown, Caesar Rodney, A.I. duPont, Indian River, Tatnall, St. Elizabeth, and Salesianum are your conference winners. The nine at-large teams might include St.Marks, McKean, Dover, Friends, Glasgow, Concord, Charter, Delmar, St. Andrews. Bubble teams are Archmere, Milford, and Brandywine.

The football tournament has two divisions that hold state tournament finals. There are 17 division one teams and all of the rest are division two. The Blue Hen Flight A and Henlopen North champions earn a Division 1 tournament berth with two at-large teams. The Blue Hen Flight B and Henlopen South champions earn a Division 2 tournament berth with two at-large teams also.

The point index to determine the at-large teams is as follows….

Division 1 opponent: 6 points for a win, 3 points for a tie, 1 point for a win. Division 2 opponent: 4 points for a win, 2 points for a tie, 0 points for a loss.
Any out of state opponent whose building houses grades 9-12 and whose current school year enrollment (boys and girls) is equal to or exceeds the current year enrollment (boys and girls in grades 9-12) of the smallest Division 1 team will be classified as Division 1. All other out-of-state opponents will be classified as Division 2 for the purposes of determining the Delaware High School Football Tournament.
Add one point for each opponent that won 7 or 8 games during the regular season. Add 2 points for each opponent that won 9 or 10 games during the regular season. Divide the total points by the total number of games played. The two teams in each division with the highest point indices will be the at-large representatives. There is a tie breaking system that includes a vote by the football committee as the last and final option.
The teams are then seeded according to the final point totals.
The first round of the tournament is Friday 11-29 and Saturday 11-30.

Right now some of these teams are easy to determine. In Division 1, as of today William Penn and Sussex Central are your Flight A and Northern champions (SC still needs to knock off Caesar Rodney though who is 4-3 and could earn a berth with an upset victory). The two at-large teams are much more difficult to figure out right now until the end-of-the-season victory totals are added to the mix. St. Marks is the third team as of today and Middletown looks like the fourth team. Newark, Sallies and Dover with their three losses each are on the bubble. Each will need to win the rest of their games and need some help from some other teams.
In Division 2, it’s Howard in Flight B, and either Delmar or Smyrna in the South. This Friday’s game between Laurel and Smyrna is the biggest Division 2 game of the year so far. The playoff destiny for each is in the balance. Laurel is 6-1 and currently third in the conference and Smyrna is undefeated at 7-0 and tied with Delmar for the top of the heap. Should Laurel lose, their playoff hopes dim, but just slightly because they do get bonus points for playing Delmar and Smyrna and their 7-win totals. Hodgson is still in the hunt with a 6-1 record but since they lost to Howard, Howard would have to lose their last two games and Hodgson would need to win their last three (including one with Sallies) to win the Division. Hodgson is still an at-large hopeful; Archmere is still in the picture at 5-1 and St. Elizabeth and Concord, both at 4-3, need all sorts of help.

In Volleyball, the champions from the Blue Hen Flight A and Flight B, Henlopen, Independent and Catholic Conferences receive berths to the tournament along with 11 at-large teams.
The at-large teams are figured by adding two points for each regular season win, no points for a loss, one bonus point for playing a team with a .501 record or better, and one additional point for playing a team with a winning percentage of .701 or better. The highest final point total is your #1 seed, the next highest is your #2 seed, etc. This tournament begins Saturday 11-2 and the championship game will be held at the Bob on 11-9.
With this in mind, here are your probable tournament teams…
Newark, A.I. duPont, Caesar Rodney, Tower Hill, and Ursuline are your conference champions. The 11 at-large teams look to be St. Elizabeth, St. Marks, Padua, Christiana, Brandywine, McKean, St. Thomas More, Charter, Caravel, Dover, Archmere with Tatnall, Dickinson, and Sanford on the outer edge.

Please remember that these were just some approximations. There are whole committees adding and dividing as we speak to come up with the final participants in each of these tournaments.

Cross Country is much easier of course. Each school sends their top seven runners to compete. The state championship is 11-9 at Killen's Pond. We will, of course, be there to provide our comprehensive 3-4 camera shoot taping at least 8 different spots on the course.

A couple of local field hockey stars have been making names for themselves for the Princeton Tigers. Following is the press release for one of them….

Hillary Schmidt Named Ivy Field Hockey Rookie of the Week
Freshman midfielder scored in win over Brown

Hillary Schmidt was named the Ivy League Field Hockey Rookie of the Week today, following her performance in a 9-1 win versus Brown.

Schmidt, playing in her eighth game of the season, tallied her second career goal at 49:23 to give Princeton a 9-0 lead. The play developed as Rachael Becker took a shot that hit the goal post. The ball rebounded to Schmidt who shot it into the open net.

That’s about it for now folks. Thanks for tuning in to delawaresports.com!

Marshal Manlove