The views expressed in this blog are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of RCN or any other agency, organization, employer or company.
Before we take a look at this week’s high school basketball polls…
I was invited to participate in the District XI press conference this past Friday to hear about how the postseason plans will change for this unusual winter sports season.
A few of the changes for girls and boys basketball within this region include:
- Districts will start w/pigtail rounds on 3/2 & 3/3 and continue on the “typical” Tue/Fri & Wed/Sat schedule.
- Tournament is an open field, everyone qualifies but teams can “opt out” if they’re not happy with the seating and / or have health concerns.
- If a school has COVID issues, their game will be postponed “as long as realistically possible” — if a team can’t play and officially goes “out” for COVID, then they are out for good and cannot re-enter the playoffs at a later date.
- Games will be at the higher seeded team’s site until championships, that will be held at a neutral site – if possible.
- Hosting site determines restrictions/crowd capacity.
For this winter wrestling postseason, adjustments include:
- Teams championships will take place on Feb. 14th, although District XI Chair Bob Hartman indicated most teams will probably “opt out” this year.
- Individual wrestling tournaments will commence the following weekend (matches will be held on the weekend to avoid scheduling issues with schools)
- Individual wrestling regionals will be held on Feb. 27th featuring the previous rounds top eight wrestlers for each weight class, with “Super Regionals” (Districts I, II, III, IV, XI and XII) the following weekend and PIAA state finals, the weekend after that.
- Currently there is no site available for the local district individual championships — obviously finding a school or other venue that is willing to host this event will be an extremely high priority over the next two weeks!
Plans are already underway for a special district winter sports playoff show discussing these and other issues on the February 25th edition of RCN SportsTalk, debuting on at 7:00 p.m. on RCN TV and will be available for free for RCN customers to view it anytime on demand!
***********
It’s time to look at our scholastic basketball polls involving the District XI teams in our viewing area heading into this week’s action.
For this winter, we are breaking the two polls down into the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference (Lehigh Valley teams only) and Colonial League schools, within the RCN broadcast area. With the reduced schedules and many of our teams staying mostly “in country” with their opponents this year due to the COVID-19 restrictions, this plan for our polls will keep things interesting since many of the top teams within the local conferences will not have the opportunity to actually face each other this fall.
While both local leagues are trying to press on with conference playoffs, the possibility of being able to crown league/district champions is still not 100-percent definite thanks to the pandemic. Our polls will be an intriguing barometer to who in fact is the best team in each conference (and, of course, bragging rights through the winter months).
So below we have high school polls for both leagues, along with the listing of all of the teams that are included in our respective categories.
Feel free to email me at Chris.Michael@rcn.net for your thoughts on this week’s poll and we might read and respond to your emails on this week’s SportsTalk show.
EPC-LV TOP 5
1) Allen
3) Dieruff
4) Parkland
5) Northampton
Eligible Teams (in no particular order):
Central Catholic, Bethlehem Catholic, Easton, Freedom, Liberty, Dieruff, Allen, Parkland, Whitehall, Emmaus, Nazareth, and Northampton
COLONIAL TOP 5
1) Notre Dame
2) Northwestern
3) Bangor
4) Palmerton
Eligible Teams (in no particular order):
Bangor, Pen Argyl, Notre Dame – Green Pond, Wilson, Catasauqua, Salisbury, Saucon Valley, Northwestern, Northern Lehigh, Southern Lehigh and Palisades
Be sure to bookmark our high school winter sports broadcast schedule here on the website and check it frequently. With several games already postponed or canceled so far this season, there could be changes from day to day!
