The Class 4A Greater St. Helens League will not participate in bi-district tournament competition this school year and instead will send two teams directly to their respective state tournaments in everything expect football and wrestling.
A bi-district agreement between District 3 (the Narrows and South Puget Sound leagues) and District 4 (GSHL) dissolved after District 3’s board voted down a preliminary agreement made in the spring, said Cale Piland, the athletic director for Evergreen Public Schools.
Shelly Thiel, the director of District 3, denied there was ever an agreement.
Regardless, District 4 learned earlier this week that its appeal to the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association could not be heard.
The 4A GSHL athletic directors will meet next week to determine district tournament formats that will send the top two teams in volleyball and girls soccer straight to state this fall.
The same will have to be done for boys and girls basketball in the winter, as well as baseball, softball, and boys soccer in the spring. This also will affect individual sports. Track and field, for example, will send two athletes per event from district to state.
The Class 3A GSHL did come to an agreement with District 4 for its bi-district competitions.
The bi-district agreements allow for districts to give up their guaranteed allotments to state in order to send more teams into the postseason, with the possibility of getting more teams to state. Without a bi-district agreement, each district can only send its WIAA allocation to state.
District 4 received two allocations to state this school year and one next year. Piland said District 4 will be working to create a bi-district plan next school year.
For 2014-15, though, the top two teams will head directly to state, and the other five will be done for the year.
Piland said that the formula used for years between District 3 and 4 gave the 4A GSHL four berths to the bi-district this school year and three the next year. Instead of going with a 12/4 and then 13/3 format for the two years to make up the 16-team bracket, Piland said administrators came up with a preliminary agreement to have the fourth-place teams from the GSHL and Narrows play a pig-tail game for the final berth into the bracket each year.
Essentially, this gave the seven-team GSHL and seven-team Narrows League 3.5 berths to bi-district — the top three teams would advance while the fourth-place teams played each other for that final spot.
“We had never had an agreement that their board did not approve,” Piland said.
Until now.
Thiel disputes Piland’s version of events.
“We did not (have an agreement). That’s not true,” Thiel said. “It was discussed.”
Thiel acknowledged that there was an offer of 13-3 for each year but there was no preliminary deal. After the spring meeting, District 3 officials brought proposals to their leagues and then to the board.
An argument was made that the GSHL should only get three berths to bi-district in both years. The District 3 board agreed with that argument.
Piland said District 3 then pulled the preliminary deal — the one Thiel says did not exist — off the table.
“We had a real good history of negotiations. It kind of fell apart this year,” Piland said.
The WIAA told the GSHL this week that there is no basis of appeal for a bi-district agreement if one district has at least two allocations to state.
Next year, District 4 (the 4A GSHL) has one allocation to state. Piland said there is a “glue provision” for districts with one allocation that ensures a bi-district partner in order to get at least two berths to the postseason. Whether that will be an agreement with District 3 remains to be seen. District 4 has had a bi-district agreement with the Seattle-based District 2 in past years.
“We have good relations,” Thiel said. “We want to continue good relations with District 4.”
With the final decision coming this week, GSHL athletic directors will meet next week to determine a district tournament schedule to come up with the top two teams after the regular season. They are not starting from scratch, though. Because they knew this was a possibility, there are already plenty of ideas, Piland said.
Again, the bi-district ruling does not affect football or wrestling. The 4A GSHL will send three football teams to the Week 10 state preliminary round playoffs. There will be three or four (TBD) wrestlers from the 4A GSHL advancing to regionals.
All other sports will battle for state berths at district tournaments.
“Our preference would have been to continue with the agreement we had,” Piland said.
One thing Piland and Thiel agreed on is there are some benefits to not having an agreement this year.
Schools will save money on travel budgets. While the top seed from Southwest Washington would host a first-round contest in the team sports, most of the competition took place in the Puget Sound area.
The district tournaments in Southwest Washington will have higher stakes, a little more drama to them, Piland said.
Also, there have been occasions when none of the teams from the 4A GSHL qualified for state via bi-district competition. Under this format, for example, two boys basketball teams and two girls basketball teams are guaranteed to go to state this school year.
