NEDAB Announces New District Format

 
For those schools that run combined boys/girls programs, it will be interesting to see how frequently they choose the same meet.

Similarly, there will be some interesting choices as it will make it easier/harder for some athletes on the same team in different events to make it out depending on the coach's choice. In other sports, except wrestling, the entire team qualifies out or doesn't. There could be some hard feelings based on coach's choices.

I do like this better than the way it has been done recently, but it isn't without drawbacks.
 
Am I understanding this correctly that one site will host 10 races on one day? I apologize if I seem dense here, but doesn't that seem like a lot of people at one race site, particularly during a year that we will be trying to make crowds smaller.
I also have memories of some of those Boardman years with multiple races in one division when it rained, and how awful that course was by the end of the day. I know it's cross country and not track, but the potential for a course being severely torn up to the point of it being the deciding factor in races is problematic in my mind.
 
Did I understand that correctly that there is going to be a set number of individuals that advance. So they will pull the team qualifiers out and then take the top # from non qualifying teams?

Yes the course could be a huge mess by the end of the day if get a few inches of rain the day before or during the day of races.
 
Can't speak to the social distancing issues, but Columbus does 12 races each year at one site for cross country. So that's an issue that is being dealt with in at least one district.

OHSAA > Central Sports & Tournaments > Cross Country

ohsaa.org

The two sites the NEDAB choses will be of great interest, especially since they have stated it is likely an east-west split. Throw in that two of the current NE districts are on college campuses (which may have different CoVid policies than the 3 high school sites), and it adds just a little more intrigue.

LOVE to see the details on this one, particularly who would go where...
 
Well coaches in some districts like Hillary Darby and Ottawa up to six teams qualify. Even on a torn up course a top tier team should be able to advance. Unless a coach takes the talent in the field to lightly and subs too many of her/his top runners. In track and field it looks like the pre draw teams will be made Up geographically . And then after a vote you can choose your site. So it looks like the powerhouse teams should choose to avoid each other until the regional hmmm,. I kinda like the strategy involved in the process for both sports.
 
My understanding is the top 19 individuals get out of Div2, which would be the same as in the past when they said top 20 individuals get out or number of teams times 4. Which I find it odd how the number got decreased by 1 in I believe all 3 divisions. It does not sound like to me that it is a group of 19 pulled out after the teams have been decided. Also very interesting that in Div2, the 5 teams that qualify for Regional will be called "District Champion" and the next 5 teams will be called "District Runner Up", even though those 2nd 5 teams do not even qualify! That means there are 20 "District Champions" where in the past there was 4!! I am reading that wrong? Also very curious, as stated earlier, that in this pandemic many sites are going to increase the number of races to 10 where there was usually only 4-6 races on site before.
 
gatornation said:
My understanding is the top 19 individuals get out of Div2, which would be the same as in the past when they said top 20 individuals get out or number of teams times 4. Which I find it odd how the number got decreased by 1 in I believe all 3 divisions. It does not sound like to me that it is a group of 19 pulled out after the teams have been decided. Also very interesting that in Div2, the 5 teams that qualify for Regional will be called "District Champion" and the next 5 teams will be called "District Runner Up", even though those 2nd 5 teams do not even qualify! That means there are 20 "District Champions" where in the past there was 4!! I am reading that wrong? Also very curious, as stated earlier, that in this pandemic many sites are going to increase the number of races to 10 where there was usually only 4-6 races on site before.
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1) I think you read it right, but it's likely a misprint by the PowerPoint creator. I'll guess it should be either the top 1 or 2 teams are declared "district champion."

2) Based on what I've heard from others, the whole proposal for XC was begun last fall, so the pandemic doesn't factor into it one way or the other.


Other random thoughts:

- Less sites should help from being spread too thin with officials and should save a small amount of money with the timing companies. The timing companies who work the sites will be paid more, but the District Board won't be paying timing companies to show up to 5 different places.

- With 10 races at a site, there's no wiggle room in the schedule like we've had in recent years when the district meet day was also a standardized testing date, and we'd move back the meet start time a few hours. As of now, district day would be October 24 which is also an ACT testing date. DII kids might be able to make it work, but DI kids won't if the plan is to run DI races first. I know most serious runners aren't looking to take the ACT in October, but as soon as I say that, a kid comes up to you at Tuesday or Wednesday's practice of district week (never Monday b/c it takes a day or two to work up the courage to tell the coach) and mentions how he or she is taking the ACT on Saturday.
 
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My only gripe is ( and I'm not even sure it's a gripe), I would have the higher seeds pick last. That way they get to look over all the competition and decide who they want to take on. As it is now, they get nothing from being #1 ranked other than they run race one or two. Woodridge is #1. They choose. Then Bay #2 gets to choose if they want to see Woodridge twice or just once. #3 $V$M has even more of a choice. What is the advantage of being #1? I'd rather be #3 than #2. At some point it's better to be higher ranked than lower, but where is that? #8 has a better picture of what is going on than all the teams ranked higher. The downside to reversing the selection order is that they would have to let the higher seeds knock lower seeds out of races. Sorry number #33, but #9 just decided you are running in another race. Being in the top 8 ranked teams might not even matter, but after that, it could make a big difference what race you are in.

I do like the thought of watching more races in a day and also watching another race in the same Division. Coaches should like that a lot. I think this way will also get closer to the best "X" number of teams making the Regional. It will also be interesting to do the post race autopsy to see if the choices were good or not. Maybe not this year, but in following years, larger crowds and concessions etc, could make for a much more fun and exciting experience for everyone. Especially younger siblings.

I hope by the time track and field comes around, I have a better sense of how that will work. I see that as being very complicated. We have the luxury of possibly splitting the coaching staff if it makes sense to have boys go one place and girls go the other, but would we really want to do that? Track and Field is a very complicated team sport and I can see overthinking it.
 
I'm still confused about how track is going to work. Can someone explain it? Are there going to be sectional meets now? The video was pretty unclear.
 
Psycho dad the #1 seed does have the option to pass. And then can place his team anywhere on The board after passing. example Coach Howard of Woodridge passes, Coach Babson Of Bay #2 Picks The Medina District. Howard then also picks Medina because he hasn’t raced Bay all year and wants to avoid Coach Stahl of Rocky River. You understand,
 
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I spent most of my coaching in the Eastern District or combined E/SE. When we were combined with the Central they went last to first but it led to very unqual districts. #10 picks district 1. #9 knows they can beat them so they also choose district 1. #8 knows they can beat them both so...... The top few would pick the same district as a rival to keep them from winning a title. They then adopted last to first until a certain point like 8 teams left and reversed the order so 2 could avoid 1, 3 could avoid 1, 4 would have a better chance against 1 instead of facing two good teams..... I know the central still seeds and chooses but I have no idea how they do it.
 
claynation said:
I'm still confused about how track is going to work. Can someone explain it? Are there going to be sectional meets now? The video was pretty unclear.
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Let's look at 1 division as an example. We'll say DII, and we'll limit the discussion to the boys. This past spring, there were going to be 4 DII boys district meet sites: Lakeview, Orrville, Perry, and Salem. With the changes, you might see a completely open district format where all DII teams are lumped together and seeded, and they then are free to choose among any of the 4 district meets as long as there is room on the bracket. Another possibility would be that they put the teams that would be going to Orrville and Salem together into 1 grouping and put the teams that would go to Lakeview and Perry into another grouping. Each grouping is seeded and chooses between 1 of 2 meets. The same procedure would occur on the girls' side, but the Powerpoint mentioned the possibility that a school's boys and girls teams could end up at separate sites. That could be a problem for schools where 1 very small coaching staff handles both genders. It would be especially challenging for the more technical event performers. If I have 1 throwing coach, and boys are throwing discus on day 1 at Site A while girls are throwing shot at Site B at the same time, that's a situation some head coaches might wish to avoid as they ponder which site to choose for each gender.


The Central District does something along these lines in DIII where there are 2 meets happening at the same site. However, I don't recall if they seed or if the teams are pre-assigned to District 1 and District 2. There has also been a DIII meet in the SE where there are 2 district meets for boys taking place but only 1 meet for the girls happening at the same site, but the boys teams are pre-assigned to either meet by geography.
 
Actually Mr. Slippery for several years at the D3 Independence site was two meets ran at the same time. There was no problem running the meets.
It actually gave a little more rest time in between events.
 
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I was just on NEDAB site. They finally took down the 2019 assignments and put up divisional boxes for the new year but information is not up on them yet. I guess we can be happy they have made some change.
 
How can we be at this point and still have no idea what is happening at Districts and Regionals or State. I shouldn't be shocked I guess. Every year we wait on things like this as though our sport is an afterthought. I would really like to know where my team is going and what the actual qualifying procedure will be. There is scouting, training, and course management that is integral that we as coaches need to know. Some courses deal in hills, some flat as pancakes. Some districts deal with tons of talented teams where you have to peak for that meet, where others you can focus on regionals. All of this affects our training and in the end, our kids performances. I know it is a crazy time, but I want my athletes to be prepared and informed. If anyone has heard anything different since July, I am sure we would all love to hear it. The NEDAB has looked like they are preparing their website for something, but they haven't done anything.
 
I saw 1 little nugget on the website:
The NE District's Sport Coordinator for Cross Country is former longtime Walsh Jesuit head coach Pat Ritchie. I wonder when that happened. I have no idea what his duties will be, but it's good to have someone like him in the mix who knows the sport as it pertains to NEO and has been around it at the HS level for more than 40 years.
 
Agreed, how is that other District websites are up and running with information and all we get is deleted information with no 2020 updates??
 
I don't think courses will be a big deal as there hasn't been a hill on a District course since Goodyear was done away with. Competition might be something you need to know going into the District.
 
psycho_dad said:
I don't think courses will be a big deal as there hasn't been a hill on a District course since Goodyear was done away with. Competition might be something you need to know going into the District.
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My kids think LCCC has a hill. It is steep and you run up it twice.

But the entire rest of the course is flat and out in the open. The challenge at LCCC is the weather (hot in August for the Avon Lake Earlybird meet, possibly chilly & breezy in October for District) because the course is open and there is no where to hide from the weather.
 
Unless that hill At LCCC has gotten smaller in the last 47 years It can be challenging. We ran our college conference championship there inn1973.
 
It's technically a hill, but not any type of hill you would have to "train" for. I would not do anything out of the ordinary to get ready for that course. Hills should be part of any training plan and that should be enough to handle LCCC. Goodyear and even Malone had hills you had to completely change stride and lean into going up and the downhill at Goodyear might have been worse than the uphill. By the time you could control your momentum on the flat after the downhill at Goodyear, you were gassed. Breathing was all messed up and your legs were toast. Normal courses throughout the season should have something that is close to LCCC.
 
In college I loved Malone and did very well there. But the Goodyear regional course killed us In high school. Not once in high school do I remember us ever doing a hill workout. I guess that is what happens when your high school cross country coach was at one time the line coach on the football team. God rest his soul.
 
I was not a Goodyear fan when I ran, but it might be the best spectator course ever. I always ran relatively well there, but I ran it too much. I would much rather run a course I've never run before than one I ran more than once. We probably ran Goodyear 2-3 times a season. Shame they do not use it anymore. Malone I just ran once a season. We ran a lot of very interesting courses. Perry (Lake County I think) used to run through a creek bed. Snowed many times there too. I ran at Virginia Kendall where the Woodridge CVNP is once a week in dual meets. Kirtland used to start in a Christmas tree farm where you ran down rows of trees as your starting box assignments, but it was chaos once you got 30 yards in and people started just running down any row they wanted to get to the choke point at the end. We ran the Portage Country League Meet at Paradise Country Club and there was a hill we ran down that was so steep it might have been negligent looking back on it. Never had such dead legs after a down hill. Can't believe no one ever snapped their leg going down that thing. The climb back up wasn't fun either. Just a few years ago Rootstown ran a course completely in the woods start to finish. Gun went off and you waited around until a runner crossed the finish line. You couldn't see any of the race. Had to be fun to run though.
 
Pat Ritchie is old school. He's probably writing it out on pieces of paper. Leaving out teams he doesn't feel are worth the time and effort. Not even entertaining the thought of girls teams participating. So, be prepared to just shut up and race and really just shut up.
 
psycho_dad said:
I was not a Goodyear fan when I ran, but it might be the best spectator course ever. I always ran relatively well there, but I ran it too much. I would much rather run a course I've never run before than one I ran more than once. We probably ran Goodyear 2-3 times a season. Shame they do not use it anymore. Malone I just ran once a season. We ran a lot of very interesting courses. Perry (Lake County I think) used to run through a creek bed. Snowed many times there too. I ran at Virginia Kendall where the Woodridge CVNP is once a week in dual meets. Kirtland used to start in a Christmas tree farm where you ran down rows of trees as your starting box assignments, but it was chaos once you got 30 yards in and people started just running down any row they wanted to get to the choke point at the end. We ran the Portage Country League Meet at Paradise Country Club and there was a hill we ran down that was so steep it might have been negligent looking back on it. Never had such dead legs after a down hill. Can't believe no one ever snapped their leg going down that thing. The climb back up wasn't fun either. Just a few years ago Rootstown ran a course completely in the woods start to finish. Gun went off and you waited around until a runner crossed the finish line. You couldn't see any of the race. Had to be fun to run though.
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I absolutely loathed that Goodyear course. HATED IT!!!!
 
Do you believe there could be any thought to going back to balanced Regionals in this time of Covid?? I was just looking at how Pickerington gets out 7, Boardman 6, Troy 4, and Tiffin 3 in Boys Division 2 and 7, 6, 3, and 4 in Girls D2.
 
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