Bracket Racket

"Decision 2008" - it's not just for Democrats and Republicans anymore. The New Year brings with it a slew of caucuses, primaries and debates - not to mention Oklahoma City deciding if the NBA is worth a penny on the dollar. It's only appropriate that in a time so dominated by the polls, the power of the vote would even make waves in high school basketball, minus the mud-slinging advertisements, of course. This year, for the first time, the state's basketball coaches are casting weekly votes to determine the top 20 in each class. What's more, the coaches' poll will ultimately be the deciding factor in how playoff brackets fill out. "What we've done for years is use a combination of newspaper rankings and it's been fine, in all honesty," said Danny Rennels, executive secretary of the Oklahoma Secondary Schools Activities Association. "It is a big job for them, though. They normally will have one person doing it and it's very difficult to see a Hollis or Broken Bow or whoever else it might be in the outlying areas, particularly for classes B through 4A. "The coaches have talked at various times about some other means of ranking the teams. The coaches came to us and asked if it was possible to use a coaches' ranking system, and we didn't know. We did some looking around, it was quite expensive to put it all together and we don't really have the staff to do rankings on top of everything else." That was until Larry Keese and his idea for OKrankings.com came into the picture about a year ago. Offering to build a site where coaches could log in, place their vote and track the rankings on a weekly basis, OKrankings.com quickly became the answer to the OSSAA's question of "how do we do this?" Now up and running, the site provides weekly top 20 rankings for all seven classes, both boys and girls. Each coach logs in, ranks the top 20 teams in his or her class, but cannot vote for their own team. The votes are available to their peers, so everyone's accountable. Teams receive 20 points each time they're voted number one, 19 for number two, and so on, down to just one point given for number 20. (Classes 6A and 5A rank all 32 teams in each class, so the point system is 32-31-30, etc.) Come playoff time, it's all important because the OSSAA uses the rankings to determine who goes where. In the past, the Tulsa World and The Oklahoman have been the primary sources for rankings, but the new system puts the power in the coaches' hands, or fingertips in this case. In addition to its stated purpose of letting coaches do the rankings, the site also keeps statistical leaders for each class along with team pages where records, results and game stats can be obtained. There is also a coaches' forum, similar to a chat room, where coaches can keep others updated on injuries, illnesses or other pertinent information. Again, everyone is held accountable for their comments - all posts carry the actual name and school of the author. The rankings and other features will even extend into other sports, with baseball, softball and track rankings due out this spring. A football poll debuts in the fall, even though football's postseason is determined by district finish, not rankings. The site is ultimately for coaches and by coaches, making the single biggest factor in its success a high level of participation. Many, if not all, of those coaches are pleased with the new system, but a wait-and-see attitude is prevalent in this first year. The most common sticking point is whether everyone will get on board and take this responsibility seriously. "Ultimately, this will be a good thing. As I've gone through each week and ranked teams, I've seen there are a lot of coaches who haven't been on there yet," said Matilda Mossman, Norman High School's head girls coach. "Those of us who see a lot of games and talk to a lot of coaches, we have a good feel for who the good teams really are. Sometimes the media just goes on win-loss records and the teams they've seen, and obviously they can't get out and see everybody. "Because of the communication of our coaches, I think ultimately, when we get everyone on board, this will be a good thing." When it comes to geography, Mossman and her fellow 5A and 6A schools aren't as affected by a good or bad ranking - the East/West divide is already set. In those classes, the number one West seed plays the number 16 West seed, followed by two versus 15, etc. Same goes for the East. Four from each side advance to state. However, for classes B through 4A, a better ranking might mean less mileage or less drama in the district, regional and area tournaments. For instance, if the number one, two and five teams are all in the same geographic region, someone's probably going to have to hit the road. It's better to be number one, where you might have to leave home for the area tournament, but have the number eight team as your most difficult opponent. With the coaches' poll, the idea is you get a true number eight instead of possibly the state's second-best team in disguise thanks to a few losses. Gordon Garner, who holds the dual role of boys and girls coach at Konawa, worries a regional bias might creep into the system, where clusters of geographic allies could form and skew the numbers. Like so many others, though, he feels the coaches' poll is a step in the right direction and probably better than relying on media outlets that can't possibly keep tabs on seven classes that span from Guymon to Broken Bow. Over time, Garner believes it will be of the utmost importance that his coaching fraternity spends some time researching what's going on around the state in their class. That logic is not lost on Okarche's coaches, who, like Konawa, present a unique challenge with the girls and boys teams often highly ranked, but still having to travel to the same site. Pleased with the direction, they think participation and appreciation are key for any impact to be felt. "I was a little happier with our latest vote because 67 of the 96 voted (Class A boys)," said Ray West, the boys coach. "Our first vote, we only had thirty-some percent vote (38%). My first thought was 'why do we have people complaining about getting a new system if they won't even vote', but now we're getting better numbers and I'm hoping we'll get it up to about 80-90 percent. We've increased every week, and I think it's going to be OK. When the season is over, you'll probably be able to evaluate it a lot better." Cherie Myers, the Okarche girls' coach, echoes West, hoping her fellow coaches understand how important it is to take some time working at their "new" job. "I think it's a step in the right direction and I truly appreciate the OSSAA listening to us and trying it. I just hope we all take it seriously and use it the right way. I was talking to someone the other day who said they saw the OK, thought it was us, but it was actually Okeene. He was very nice and it was an honest mistake, but I hope something like that doesn't hurt someone later. "We asked for this, now we have to do it right."