Let’s get one thing clear.
The way high school sports are run in the state of Washington is goofy. It has always been goofy. And unless something dramatic happens, it will continue to be goofy.
It’s not one person’s fault, or one body’s fault. It’s a systemic problem that has grown out for years and years. That makes fixing it difficult.
So this week, when the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association releases its first rankings that will be used to seed teams into its state basketball tournaments, it’s important to remember this is just the first step to fix a broken system.
But there is a long way to go and many more steps to take.
We’ll start with the ranking system that will be used — Rating Percentage Index or RPI. It’s a ranking system that has been used for years by the NCAA to seed teams into its national tournaments.
It is compiled by three components — a team’s winning percentage, the winning percentage of its opponents, and the winning percentage of its opponents’ opponents.
The big question is whether a system that has been used in college — and has had its critics — will work when applied to high school sports, and more specifically, when applied to high school sports in the state of Washington.
No one really knows the answer to that. And that’s why limitations have been placed on the ranking system in this first year.
The first factor is the WIAA’s hands-off approach to how teams qualify for its state tournaments. The WIAA allocates berths to the different districts around the state, then lets those districts determine how teams will qualify for those berths.
It’s kind of like a parent of six kids who has three tickets to Disneyland saying “You kids figure out who gets to go. I’ll be waiting out in the car.”
Because of that, teams in some districts may play only two postseason games between the end of the regular season and the start of state, while teams in other districts may play six or more.
The WIAA has a rule that limits basketball teams to 20 games in the regular season. If a team inadvertently schedules a 21st game — even if that game is an exhibition against its alumni team — it could be a violation that prevents a team from going to state.
But in the postseason — when games are heightened and more impactful — you can have some teams play two games while other teams get to play six? What sense does that make?
Like I said — goofy.
It was this inequity that led the WIAA to omit these league and district playoffs from its RPI formula. So every team will be graded on its r?sum? in the regular season only, even though those postseason games often tell us the most about a team than any game it plays all season.
Secondly, because the WIAA was not confident that out-of-state teams would accurately post results to MaxPreps — the idea that all in-state teams would post all results to the preps website contracted by the WIAA to collect all results is an iffy proposition at best — it was decided that all out-of-state opponents would be given a default winning percentage of .500.
So the game the Prairie girls played last week against the second-ranked team in the nation will count the same to the Falcons’ RPI than if they had played a winless team from Winnemucca, Nev. So that’s hardly ideal.
And finally, classification is not a factor when figuring out a team’s RPI. So a game against a 4A team with a .750 win percentage counts the same as a game against a 1A team with a .750 win percentage. And, of course, they are not the same.
So a team could artificially amplify its RPI by scheduling games against teams from lower classifications.
Now, we wouldn’t expect a team to purposefully do that. But remember, I told you this state is goofy.
In this state, we have several split-classification leagues — leagues made up of 3A teams, 2A teams and 1A teams.
If a 3A team plays in a league comprised of 2A and 1A teams, that 3A team could have an amplified RPI. Conversely, a 3A team in a league with 4A teams could have a reduced RPI.
Even with these flaws, using this RPI system to seed teams into the state tournament is better than the previous system that depended upon random chance in an attempt to keep things fair for all.
It’s like finding the most buoyant rock on the seashore.
Here’s how bad the previous system was. The WIAA has this practice of shielding the state tournament bracket from participating teams, because of a worry that teams might be tempted to get a better draw by losing a seeding game.
When you have a system that might encourage teams to lose, you’ve got a bad system.
So this seeding system that uses RPI will fix some of the problems in this state, but not all. We can only hope new improvements come every year.
Change doesn’t happen overnight when it comes to preps in Washington. It comes in baby steps.
This is just the first step.
Tim Martinez is the assistant sports editor/prep coordinator for The Columbian. He can be reached at 360-735-4538, tim.martinez@columbian.com or follow his Twitter handle @360TMart.
