Alright, I'm going to try really hard to make sense of this.
The NIAA released its latest realignment proposal, which was sent to all Nevada schools Tuesday morning and to the media later in the afternoon.
The state superintendents will discuss the proposal at their February meeting and the NIAA Board of Control will vote on it in March. If approved, the realignment would be for two years and would go into effect this fall.
If it's defeated, the current alignment will remain in place through Spring 2012.
Bottom line, for Douglas High, we're looking at a 12-team Northern 4A (11 for football) with either one or two leagues, which is still to be determined.
There are no real shockers here. Elko, South Tahoe and Fallon would drop to the 3A. Wooster would remain in the 4A in all sports except for football. Hug, which had been dropped in previous realignment proposals, would remain in the 4A in all sports.
In the one-league format, you'd have Manogue, Carson, Damonte Ranch, Douglas, Galena, Hug, McQueen, North Valleys, Reed, Reno, Spanish Springs and Wooster.
There is no distinction on how scheduling would work in this format. It's likely that in football, everyone would just play 10 games and see everyone in the Northern 4A every season.
That makes sense. I'd assume they'd stick with the top eight teams making the playoffs, which in the grand scheme of things would make for a highly-competitive playoff race (Think about it: traditional powers are McQueen, Reed, Reno, Douglas, Manogue, Galena and Hug. Carson and North Valleys are on the rise, as is Spanish Springs. That's nine teams for eight spots. Damonte had a great year two years ago, so that leaves for the possibility of everyone having a legitimate shot every year.
My thinking is the playoffs would go No. 1 seed against No. 8, 2 against 7, 3 against 6 and so on. It'd be a great format.
After that, though, I don't know. Every other sport, save baseball and softball, would either have to play each team twice (making for a 22-game league schedule - remember Wooster joins for everything but football), or play some sort of rotating 2-and-1 scheme.
With baseball and softball, you're looking at a possible 33-game league schedule if they go three games against each regional opponent. That would theorectically take 10 weeks to complete, which if you eliminate almost all non-league play would put the end of the regular season in mid-May, right about the same time the state tournament currently concludes.
I can't see that that scenario is going to fly. In the diamond sports (particularly baseball), you almost have to have a three-game series in league play to get a good idea of who is really good team. Anything less, with the current pitching inning limits, leaves the door open for one guy to completely take over a season.
The other way they could take it is have three game series against, say, seven or eight teams, and one-game matchups with the remaining three. That would have to rotate annually, but it still leaves a lot up to the luck of the draw when it comes to league records.
Which is why the second scenario in the proposal will probably carry more weight (Getting confused yet? I know I am).
In Scenario II, the 12-team Northern 4A (11 in football) will be split into High Desert and Sierra Leagues configured almost identical to what we have now, minus the 3A departures.
The High Desert would be Hug, McQueen, North Valleys, Reed, Reno and Spanish Springs.
The Sierra would be Manogue, Carson, Damonte Ranch, Douglas, Galena and Wooster.
In all sports but football, you'd play each league opponent twice with one mandatory crossover game. In baseball and softball, I can only assume it'd be a similar structure, only with three-game series against each league opponents and maybe a couple mandatory crossovers.
In football, I don't know. They don't give an outline, so maybe they're still thinking having one super league, which as stated above, would be highly competitive. The latter scenario is probably the more likely of the two.
Where it gets really complicated is in the 2A and 3A, which would essentially become one classification during the regular season and two classes during the postseason.
The Northern 3A would be split into three leagues: the Mount Rose (Incline, North Tahoe, Sparks, South Tahoe, Truckee and Whittell), the Lahontan (Fallon, Dayton, Fernley, Lovelock, ROP, Silver Stage and Yerington) and the Ruby Mountain (Battle Mountain, Elko, Lowry, Spring Creek, West Wendover and White Pine).
Are you ready for this? The Lahontan League would be split out to play schools in the Mount Rose and Ruby Mountain Leagues for non-league contests, which would help in determining seeding for the postseason. The Mount Rose and Ruby Mountain Leagues, in all sports but football, would not play each other during the regular season in order to save on travel costs.
Incline, North Tahoe, Whittell, Lovelock, ROP, Silver Stage, Yerington, Battle Mountain, West Wendover and White Pine would comprise the schools battling for Northern 2A postseason spots (although White Pine would go south for the entirety of football).
Sparks, South Tahoe, Truckee, Fallon, Dayton, Fernley, Lowry and Spring Creek would comprise the Northern 3A teams for the postseason.
The two classes would be seperate for the entirety of football, with Wooster thrown into the mix as well.
After that, there is no real distinction on the 1A, except that Lund, Round Mountain and Tonopah would join the 1A with Jackpot possibly going to Idaho. The 20-team (or 19 depending on Jackpot) Region would be split into either two, three or four leagues.
If two leagues, the West and East would play in seperate playoffs.
If three leagues, West, Central and East would go to seperate playoffs with possible crossovers to be announced.
If four leagues, the Northwest and Soutwest would meet in one regional playoff while the Central and East would meet in another regional playoff.
So there you have it. It's complicated (in some cases, very complicated) on the front end but I can see where there are some workable solutions on the horizon. I love the idea of the super football legaue in the Northern 4A and think overall the proposed Northern 4A would be highly competitive (although, personally, I'd love to see a super soccer league with the lake schools and added to the 4A, but that's never going to happen).
This week is going to say a whole lot about where this year's Douglas boys' basketball squad actually is. Manogue is the perceived favorite, but they struggled a bit offensively last year against the Tigers.
What's crazy, is that Douglas has improved defensively 10-fold since last season, so it will be interesting to see how the Miners respond, especially without Keith Fuetsch, who had 12 points in each of the two league matchups last year. The danger is still Bobby Hunter, who's only improved after 25- and 17-point outbursts against the Tigers last year.
The most interesting matchup of the game, though, will come when the Tigers have the ball.
This has been a program with a basic, bread-and-butter go-to guy offensively for at least the last decade (probably a lot more). The problem with that is that eventually someone in the region comes up with a specific plan to stop the go-to guy (usually it's untimely, like in the first round of the playoffs) and that's when you find out just how good the rest of the team is.
You look at the Tigers' roster this year and there simply isn't just one or two guys you gameplan for. You have to stop a system, which is fine in theory, but the thing about Douglas is that they have strong players executing the system.
There are probably five guys on the roster this year who, through their own facets, can legitimately take over a game when the opportunity arises. With most groups, that is a recipe for disaster because you most often get that many guys trying to take over a game at the same time, even when it just isn't their night.
But from what the Tigers have shown so far this year, is that they are perfectly willing to let the game flow to who it will naturally. They are unselfish with the ball and create tremendous opportunities for the other guys on the floor with their penetration.
They run through the post, sure, but they aren't going to live and die by the points scored from the post. The other side of that is that they don't live and die by the outside shot either, which is something you see with a lot of up-tempo teams.
Here's a couple of things to note heading into this week's game with the Miners:
- Through 15 games this year, Douglas has had five different players lead the team in scoring, each doing so multiple times.
- Of those five, two don't start.
- Of those two who don't start, one - Jeremy Burkhart - has led the team in scoring the most times this season (four).
- Douglas has had two or more players in double figures in 13 out of 15 games.
- They've had three or players in double figures four times.
- They've had every player on the roster score in two games.
- In nearly every game this season, Douglas has had all 12 of its players in the game by the end of the first half -- sometimes by the end of the first quarter. That's important for three reasons:
1. Everyone on the roster (the team only has two seniors) is getting legitimate minutes and the resultant big-game experience. Come playoff time, that leaves you with a roster full of guys who know how to play in big games.
2. With an up-tempo offense and pressure defense, you need to be that deep to run the system effectively, especially through tournament play.
3. As a coach, you know who showed up to play and who didn't before the game heads into crunch time. Everyone has their feet wet by the first 14 or 15 minutes. If you've got 12 guys ready, great. If not, you can whittle the rotation down until you have a set that is going to work through the end of the game.
It is what it is. The crazy thing is, only two players are set to graduate and there's an undefeated junior varsity team waiting in the wings. Should make for a competitive offseason.
- "We're here at the PapaJohns.com Bowl speaking with Papa John. Hey, thanks for the pizza, Papa John," - radio broadcast of the Papajohns.com Bowl.
