The deadline for points toward the District 5 Dual-Meet Tournament was Tuesday night and North Star made the most of it. By beating Meyersdale 48-24 on a night when almost no one else in the region held any kind of sporting event, the Cougars leapfrogged Northern Bedford County in the standings.
That's a big spot because it's the difference between wrestling at Berlin Brothersvalley on Thursday and wrestling at Somerset. I'm not sure how the Cougars will match up against the Golden Eagles, but it's much better than they do with the Mountaineers.
Berlin beat North Star 49-18 on Jan. 9, and I don't think that a rematch would go much better for the Cougars. They do, however, have a realistic chance of beating Somerset. In fact, without actually breaking down the dual match by match, I'd give North Star a slight edge.
Of course, even a semifinal victory will probably only stave off the inevitable for a few days, as the winner of Thursday night's match gets top-seeded Chestnut Ridge in Saturday's semifinal round.
If this ridiculous cold spell had not blown through the region, Northern Bedford, likely would have been at Somerset. I'm assuming the Panthers would have beaten Juniata Valley on Tuesday night and held on to the advantage over North Star. Instead, NBC gets to visit Berlin on Thursday.
Since the bus didn't break down and leave the Cougars stranded alongside the road in sub-zero temps, it was definitely a good decision by coach Tim Rosa and the Cougars to go ahead with the match. Instead, it was Northern Bedford that got left out in the cold.
Of course, there's a whole different argument about the wisdom of District 5 not including dual-meet tournaments in its standings. There's a school of thought that the reason those results aren't included -- even though the majority of the D5 teams now compete in at least one dual-meet tournament -- is that Bedford doesn't schedule them and that, for some reason, whatever Bedford wants Bedford usually seems to get.
UPDATE: That school of thought would be wrong, according to coach Brian Creps. He told me that Bedford has consistently voted for dual-meet tournaments to count in the standings. He said that Berlin, Chestnut Ridge and others have pushed for them not to count.
I'm not saying that is the case, but I honestly don't know that there is a good excuse for not including the dual-meet tournaments in the district standings. Is there a chance to rack up some easy wins against bad competition? Sure. But it's also ridiculous that Chestnut Ridge's victory over Burrell and Berlin's win over Greenville - both of which are ranked among the top teams in the state - don't count.
District 5 Dual-Meet Tournament schedule
ThursdayNo. 1 Chestnut Ridge, bye
No. 5 North Star at No. 4 Somerset, 7 p.m.
No. 6 Northern Bedford at No. 3 Berlin Brothersvalley, 7 p.m.
No. 2 Bedford, bye
Saturday
At Chestnut Ridge
No. 1 Chestnut Ridge vs. Somerset/North Star winner, 11 a.m.
Northern Bedford/Berlin Brothersvalley winner vs. Bedford, 11 a.m.
Championship, at 2 p.m.
| DISTRICT FIVE "AA" WRESTLING RATINGS | |||||
| RANK | TEAM | WON | LOST | POINTS | RATING |
| 1 | Chestnut Ridge | 9 | 0 | 54 | 6.000 |
| 2 | Bedford | 7 | 1 | 42 | 5.250 |
| 3 | Berlin | 6 | 1 | 36 | 5.143 |
| 4 | Somerset | 6 | 2 | 37 | 4.625 |
| 5 | North Star | 5 | 3 | 30 | 3.750 |
| 6 | Northern Bedford | 6 | 4 | 36 | 3.600 |
| 7 | Conemaugh Twp. | 3 | 4 | 18 | 2.571 |
| 8 | Meyersdale | 2 | 4 | 12 | 2.000 |
| 9 | Hope for Hyndman | 2 | 8 | 12 | 1.200 |
| 10 | Tussey Mountain | 1 | 7 | 6 | 0.750 |
| 11 | Everett | 1 | 9 | 6 | 0.600 |
| 12 | Shade | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0.000 |
I wouldn't not jump to conclusions about Bedford getting what they want. If D5 allows Dual meet tournaments into the fold. Then they better take strength of schedule into account. Because Bedford and Chestnut Ridge by far wrestle a tougher schedule. Before you really show your Berlin bias you may want to think about what you are saying. My opinion is let every team in D5 into District duals because we are not too big and would still be able to do it all on Thursday and Saturday.
ReplyDeleteThere's no perfect system. District 6 allows dual-meet tournaments to count, but they also just ended up with 3-0 Westmont as the fourth seed, which I think is ridiculous as well.
ReplyDeleteI don't know that suggesting that dual-meet tournaments be included shows any kind of bias. Bedford does wrestle a very difficult tournament schedule, and they should be applauded for that. But to say that their dual-meet schedule rivals Chestnut Ridge's this year is laughable. The Laurel Highlands is having another down year, so what quality dual meet win does Bedford have? North Star? Cambria Heights? Somerset? All are decent teams, but nowhere near the caliber of the competition that Chestnut Ridge faced at the Brookville Ultimate Duals. Berlin didn't face many good teams in its dual-meet tournament, but surely you'd concede that Greenville is better than any team Bedford wrestled outside of Chestnut Ridge.
It didn't matter this year because Chestnut Ridge ended up with the top seed any way, but how about this hypothetical: Suppose Chestnut Ridge's match with Bedford got snowed out and they couldn't get it made up before the deadline. What if Bedford ended up first, Chestnut Ridge second and Berlin third? I haven't checked the math to see if this would have happened - as I said it's purely hypothetical.
But wouldn't you have a problem seeing Berlin and Chestnut Ridge meet in the semifinals because their dual-meet tournament points don't count?
It didn't mean much this year because Berlin and Bedford likely would have been 2-3 either way and I don't think Northern Bedford will be able to upset Berlin for any of it to matter. Of course, if someone from Berlin gets injured on Thursday, when Berlin could have had a bye, that would change the impact of the seeds greatly.
Anyway, my point, which really didn't concern Berlin at all, is that I don't see why dual-meet tournaments don't count if the majority of the teams in District 5 are participating in them.
I'd have no problem adding a strength of schedule component to it if they included the dual-meet tournament results. In fact, I'd strongly encourage it. But, as I said, it seems like any system is going to have some potential flaws to it.
I think that top 6 qualifying + any with .500 record or better qualifying is sufficient...no need to invite all of D5.
DeleteIf I was seeding the squads I'd go 1) CR, 2) Ber, 3) Bed, 4) NS, 5) Som, 6) NBC. 2/3 being decided via performance in common matches against CR and NS. 4/5 being decided in common performance against CR.
Per my calculations if CR/Bedford hadn't happened CR would be 8-0, Bedford 7-0. However I'm guessing that if that was the case that Bedford would have scheduled their Johnstown/Richland/Claysburg makeup 3 match in one night earlier to insure that it wouldn't be wiped out by weather. Plus an undefeated Bedford would top an undefeated Chestnut Ridge if Bedford had a win over AAA Johnstown.
I'm curious to hear the comments from Cornell (Berlin) and Lazor (Chestnut Ridge) on the matter.
I think you're doing a great job and a wonderful service to the wrestling community. Please don't let silly comments offend you or make you question your integrity. And PLEASE continue your blog for all of us out there who DO appreciate all you do.
ReplyDeleteI think that Eric's skin is thick enough that he's not going to pack up the blog over the matte.
DeleteHowever it is interesting that some D5 wrestling fans have expressed to Eric the opinion that "whatever Bedford wants Bedford usually seems to gets." - My unoffical count on recent issues is that Bedford is 0-3 @ D5 - district dual scoring, D5 Vice President, and wanting D5 site to be held @ UPJ.
Regardless hopefully as a result of this blog a better system will be in place for D5 for next season.
Thanks Serious Wrestling Fan, but Odoyelrules is right, I can handle a little criticism. I can admit that I screwed up part of the post. I still believe that the district should take the dual-meet tournaments into account,no matter which teams support it (or don't).
ReplyDeleteBut the "Berlin bias" comment as well as some of the things I've seen on message boards just confirm to me that I made the right decision in not covering Berlin for the newspaper this year. No matter how objective I try to remain, there are always going to be people that believe that I don't like their team and that I favor another.