WPIAL athletic directors want basketball sections divided by ability not enrollment

By: Chris Harlan
Thursday, April 14, 2022 | 1:19 AM

Purchase Photo Options

What if basketball sections were determined by a team’s talent level rather than its school enrollment?

A group of WPIAL athletic directors presented that idea to the WPIAL board in a proposal that would group teams by ability instead of the number of students in the school, an idea meant to fix a perceived competitive imbalance between public and private schools.

The board met Wednesday and referred the plan to the WPIAL basketball committee for feedback.

“What we would like to see happen is for the basketball committee to look at it,” WPIAL executive director Amy Scheuneman said. “The committees are tasked with creating sections and (making) tournament recommendations. We want to see a recommendation from the basketball committee to our board, which may include or may not include some of their suggestions. That’s kind of where we are right now.”

The athletic directors pulled the plan together in a matter of weeks with hopes of seeing changes take place before next season.

“The consensus of the group is to have a pilot program in the 2022-23 school year in the sport of basketball to address some of the competitive balance issues,” said Peters Township athletic director Brian Geyer, a member of the WPIAL board.

The athletic directors started their effort by seeking a way to overhaul all sports but narrowed the scope to football and basketball before finally focusing solely on basketball. Geyer said the recent dominance of private school teams in the state basketball championships showed there might be a “more glaring issue” in that sport.

The WPIAL hasn’t yet released an updated section alignment for next basketball season. The league is waiting to see what teams might move to a higher classification under the PIAA competition formula.

However, Scheuneman said the deadline to overhaul the traditional section format before next season has passed. The 2024-25 season, the start of the next two-year cycle, would be a more realistic target, she said.

“Their goal is to start the conversation,” Scheuneman said. “The timing of this for the next cycle is passed. I think we’re talking about, ‘How do we incorporate some of these ideas for the following two-year cycle?”

The main crux of the proposal would see basketball teams separated by ability, meaning some small schools such as WPIAL Class A boys champion Bishop Canevin or Class 2A champion Our Lady of the Sacred Heart might face bigger-school opponents.

“Instead of sections based off of classifications, sections are based off of competitive balance,” Geyer said. “Throw the six classifications out and go to three — a good, better, best method.”

The WPIAL playoffs would revert back to six classifications based on enrollment with an open tournament format. Geyer said the proposal included a “tiered points system” that would be a guide to help rank teams for the playoff brackets.

“If a 6A school is going to play all single-A schools, obviously they should get less points than if they’re playing (similar) enrollment-sized schools.”

Geyer said another member of the athletic directors committee came up with a second proposal as well, but it wasn’t submitted in time for consideration at Wednesday’s WPIAL board meeting. The athletic directors committee’s efforts began in earnest in February. They met last week in person and again this week online to finalize their proposal.

“As I told the committee, it was very ambitions to get this done for this cycle,” Geyer said.

Chris Harlan is a TribLive reporter covering sports. He joined the Trib in 2009 after seven years as a reporter at the Beaver County Times. He can be reached at charlan@triblive.com.