The boys’ beast from the East

There are six 4A class districts in Arkansas, the 4A-1, 4A-3, 4A-4, 4A-5, 4A-7 and the 4A-8. They are broken down into three regions, the North (4A-1 and 4A-4), the East (4A-3 and 4A-5) and the South (4A-7, and 4A-8).

Most regions have district tournaments to see which four teams advance to region play (the south doesn’t). The four teams that lose in the first round of region are done with the four other teams moving on, guaranteed at least three more games. Upsets in district competition skew the pairings relative to rankings, and upsets came in bunches last week.

This year, one of the boys’ regions (East) will have seven of their eight teams ranked in the state’s overall ranked Top 10. They boast the No. 1 ranked Blytheville, No. 3 Little Rock Mills, No. 4 Little Rock Pulaski, No. 5 Jonesboro Westside, No. 6 Valley View, No. 8 Little Rock eStem, and No. 10 Little Rock Robinson. Poor little old No. 14-ranked Brookland is the only team playing not currently in the state’s Top 10. That meet is at the Valley View gym west of Jonesboro.

If you play in the 4A East, it might be beastly just getting to state. Top-ranked Blytheville has to play state ranked No. 4-ranked Pulaski in the that first round with the loser calling it a season. State ranked No. 3 Mills plays state ranked No. 6 Valley View with that loser headed home for the season. No. 5 Westside battles No. 8 eStem and No. 10 Robinson plays a No. 14-ranked Brookland team that has been on a roll lately. However it comes out, there will be three and perhaps four Top 10 teams that won’t be at state.

The South Region has two Top 10 teams in their final eight that being No. 2 Magnolia and No. 9 Monticello with both teams out of the 4A-8. Other teams playing include No. 11 Arkadelphia, No. 12 Malvern, No. 13 Nashville, No. 19 Warren, No. 28 Bauxite and No. 34 Camden. Magnolia was to start things off with Bauxite Wednesday, followed by a Malvern/ Camden battle. Thursday, Nashville plays Warren and Monticello plays Arkadelphia. Monticello is a current Top 10 team with Arkadelphia ranked in the Top 10 for most of the season. Malvern was the unexpected victor in the 4A-7 title match. The South Region is being played in Crossett in extreme southern Arkansas.

This year, the North Region has the lone golden ticket, the extra seed into the state Elite Eight. The state tournament consists of 12 teams, using the top four from each region to make up the field. With a four-round bracket, there needs to be four teams seeded into the final eight. Each region champion gets one of those seeds with the other quarterfinal seed rotating among the three regions. This season, the North Region has the extra pass meaning that both finalists in the North Region will land in the final eight at the state level of competition.

At the 4A North Region tournament hosted by Berryville Wednesday, No. 22-ranked Ozark (18-8), the champion of the 4A-4, plays 23rd-ranked Shiloh (15-10). The Hillbillies are 12-2 since the Christmas break, losing only to Morrilton and Pottsville. That game will be followed up by our seventh-ranked Pea Ridge Blackhawks (22-4), the champ of the 4A-1, taking on No. 16-ranked Dardanelle (24-4). Thursday, 21st-ranked Berryville (19-10) matches up with 15th-ranked Morrilton (19-8) with 26th-ranked Pottsville (12-11) taking on 24th-ranked Prairie Grove (15-12). The Pottsville/Prairie Grove matchup is the lowest ranked game in all of regional play.

If the Hawks come out on top of the Sand Lizards Wednesday, they will face the winner of the Pottsville/Prairie Grove game Friday in semifinal action. The Hillbillies are 12-2 since the Christmas break, losing only to Morrilton and Pottsville. The winner of Ozark/Shiloh plays the winner of Berryville/Morrilton.

Girls Region competition will be tough

On paper, it looks like the 4A-1 girls should dominate the North Region with all four 4A-1 teams ranked in the Top 10 with all the 4A-4 girls ranked in the second 10 or lower.

Hold the phone. Ozarks girls were like a Hillbilly in a china shop last week, ignoring their seventh seed in the district tournament, winning four games in five days to claim a completely unexpected title. The Lady ’Billies were 3-9 in conference play, then won four times in the conference tournament to take a No. 1 seed into the region. They and their underdog boys counterparts brought both district championship trophies home to Ozark.

Ozark, (ranked 18th in state with an 18-11 record) plays Gravette Wednesday. The Lions are ranked ninth with a 18-10 record. The other girls game Wednesday is the state top-ranked Farmington girls (26-3) who play 13th-ranked Pottsville (14-9). Thursday, the seventh-ranked Lady Blackhawks take the floor against the 4A-4 regular season champion 11th-ranked Morrilton Devil Dogs (19-5). The Hawks/Devil Dogs game will be playing after the No. 3-ranked Harrison (25-2)

21st-ranked Clarksville (12-14).

The Lady Hawks had to earn their third seed, winning three out of four contests over a four-day stretch. They beat Prairie Grove 45-39 in an elimination game, then upset Berryville 52-51 in an other elimination game the next day. On their third straight night of competition, playing against the state’s No. 1-ranked team who had yet to compete, the Hawks faded to a 5139 defeat. Two days later, they were re-energized, as they took down Gravette 35-21.

Over in the East, state third-ranked Batesville plays 25th-ranked Wynne in the opener Wednesday with fourth-ranked Pulaski taking on 30th-ranked Highland in the night cap. Thursday sees 14thranked Robinson tackle 12th-ranked Pocahontas in the first girls game with sixth-ranked Batesville Southside battling 22ndranked Stuttgart in the second.

Down in the South Region, fifth-ranked Star City starts the competition against 26th-ranked Bauxite followed by 10thranked DeQueen tipping it off with 31st-ranked Crossett. Thursday, 20thranked Magnolia plays 28th-ranked Mena to be followed by 15th-ranked Nashville playing 17thranked Warren. This year, Nashville will be playing Warren in both boys and girls first round matches.

My plan for the state

With Pea Ridge and Ozarks girls being forced to play four games over a fiveday period, I have a suggestion to perhaps eliminate the need to ever to do that to a team of high school athletes.

There are 48 high schools in the 4A classification, broken down into six districts, two with nine teams, two with eight teams and two with seven teams. The districts are the 4A-1, 4A-3, 4A-4, 4A-5, 4A-7 and 4A-8. There is no 4A-2 or 4A-6.

How about breaking the districts down into eight six-team leagues? We have those 4A-2 and 4A-6 districts than no one is using right now and they could come in handy.

Usually, the first- and second-place finishers in league races seed into the semifinals of the district tournament. With a six-school format, no one would play more than three games a week in a district tournament. With eight districts, a new region could be formed, the West Region. No one is using that direction anyway.

My idea would eliminate byes in the state tournament and give more teams the chance to participate, which means more money for the AAA. More region games also equals more money for the AAA as well.

Both Hawks boys and girls riding high with a seventh state ranking

The girls’ strong showing last week bumped them up a little, landing them in the seventh spot, a spot the boys team ascended to a week earlier.

With the games increasing with importance on each passing level, a lot of scrambling on the Top 10 lists is in the offing, especially after the rash of upsets spring in last week’s district competitions. Next week’s polls could look very different than this week’s list.