MARLBOROUGH — The days of Western Massachusetts high school tournaments are now officially numbered.
Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association (MIAA) member schools voted 193-140 at Friday’s special assembly meeting to approve a statewide tournament structure, eliminating sectional tournaments throughout the Commonwealth. The meeting and vote of MIAA member schools was the culmination of a two-year process, with the organization’s Tournament Management Committee (TMC) offering its final pitch to the packed auditorium at Assabet Valley Regional Technical High School.
The approval means: 1) The sectional tournament format will be removed and teams will be conducted in divisions established statewide. 2) The top 32 teams will qualify for postseason based on Power Ranking. Teams that achieve a regular season record above .500 but are outside the top 32 will also qualify for the postseason. 3) Teams will be seeded by power ranking system conducted by MaxPreps, starting in the fall of 2020.
The statewide format will not take into effect until the 2021-22 school year.
The measure was widely panned throughout Western Massachusetts. Franklin County Technical School Athletic Director Joe Gamache was one of those who spoke against the proposal during Friday’s meeting, and he questioned the Tournament Management Committee , whose members were seated at a long table on the auditorium’s stage, about the potential travel associated with a move to a statewide tournament structure.
“As with the results of any type of election and vote, everybody that showed up here had their voices heard and their vote heard,” explained Gamache after the final tally of votes was read. “These are now the circumstances that we have to deal with. So we need to figure out how we’re going to move forward and keep what’s in the best interest of our student-athletes, at least in Western Mass. We have to figure out how we can preserve their best interest moving forward and try to sell them an opportunity that they no longer will receive with the MIAA as it currently stands.”
Turners Falls AD Adam Graves also voted ‘No’ at Friday’s meeting, though he said he was not surprised by the final outcome. The MIAA’s Board of Directors recommended to support the measure for adoption during a Dec. 11 meeting by a 15-0-2 vote.
“There are still so many questions that haven’t been answered,” offered Graves afterward. “They keep saying the answers are going to come. Well, now we’re here, when are those answers going to come?
“For me, now we lose those hometown games,” he continued. “We had a (boys basketball playoff) game the other night hosting Franklin Tech. The gym was packed, it was a great atmosphere. Are we ever going to get that back again? Are we ever going to get (basketball) games back at the Cage again, that championship Saturday where teams are playing one game after another? I don’t think it’s ever going to be like that, but it’s now our job as ADs going forward to preserve what we think we do well in the West, which is the way we run our tournaments.”
Friday’s meeting began with several remarks from members of the Tournament Management Committee , with MIAA President Jeff Granatino confirming that statewide tournaments have never been used before by the MIAA.
“It’s clearly a paradigm shift from the current structure,” said Granatino, superintendent of the Marshfield Public Schools.
Tournament Management Committee member Pam Gould, superintendent of the Sandwich Public Schools, offered some of the more elaborate comments from the committee on Friday.
“I have always felt there have been inequities in the way we run (our tournaments),” Gould told the assembly. “We’ve been working on this specific plan for the past two years. We tried our best to answer all the situations that have come up. Are things perfect? No. The big key, is this better for the kids as a whole? Does it create more equity around the state? Yes. We believe this is better for all kids.”
Gamache disputed those comments, referring to the list of concerns raised by several MIAA school representatives during the meeting that included travel, time on learning and the speed in which the process moved toward Friday’s vote.
“I’ll never actually believe this is in the best interest of the entire state,” the Franklin Tech AD countered.
Longmeadow High School Principal Tom Landers spoke before the crowd about the voting process, inferring that the MIAA moved hastily in calling the special assembly.
“Considering the TMC knew this was going to be a hot-button topic, and that a lot of the info rolled out to the public on Feb. 4 and today is Feb. 28, and the first info session in Western Mass. was just this Monday … if you’re looking for why people from the west feel forgotten, look no further,” Landers stated.
Western Mass. tournaments in their current divisional iteration have taken place since 1972. Turners Falls High School won the first Division 3 boys basketball title, and Frontier Regional School won the girls basketball crown that winter.
History and nostalgia associated with moments throughout sectional tournaments are the biggest losses moving forward, according to Gamache.
“I know the energy and the faces that I got from kids before, during and after our playoff game (Thursday night),” began Gamache, who is also the girls basketball coach at Franklin Tech. “The enthusiasm about an opportunity to play at the Cage, which is a Western Mass. basketball destination… it really meant something to our kids. It’s going to be a little more difficult to say, we have a four-game road to play for a state championship, there is no more Cage. We’re going to go play a first-round game in Nantucket and then if we win, we might have to go out to Lee the following week and if we win that, who knows, we could be down to Rockport for Round 3. It is what it is, we’re going to have to deal with it the best we can moving forward and try to preserve the best interests of our student-athletes since I don’t think that was represented here today.”