The NJSIAA released the girls 2019 rules today.
https://www.njsiaa.org/sites/default/fi ... ations.pdf
As expected, power points will be used for playoff seeding. A new seeding system was needed due to the demise of LaxPower whose rankings had been used for NJ playoff seeding in prior years.
The general outline is as follows. A team gets six points for a win, zero for a loss. (I am omitting the rules on power points for ties since ties are exceedingly unlikely given the sudden death OT rules.) A team also gets three points for each win by an opponent the team defeated
plus one point for each win by an opponent that defeated the team.
Power points are only awarded for a team’s first 13 games
and for the first 13 games of the team’s opponents. The rules state that the records of out-of-state opponents must be reported by the team to
www.njschoolsports.com. Now that LaxPower is out of business, I wonder if teams will have difficulties finding out the records of their OOS opponents. Hopefully, out of state coaches will cooperate.
The team with the highest number of power points is seeded first, etc. Tie breakers: (1) winning percentage; (2) head to head; (3) common opponent; (4) coin toss. It seems odd (wrong) to me that head to head isn’t the first tie breaker. Also, what is meant by “common opponent”? The results of games against common opponents? How exactly are those results weighed? What if the common opponent was, say, the 10th game for team 1, but the 15th game for team 2? Is that common opponent still used for the tie breaker even though for team 2 the game is outside the 13 game cutoff and wasn’t used for power point purposes?
TOC seeding will be based on power points at the time of initial playoff seeding.
The 13 game rule will cause some tough opponents to be counted for PP purposes and some not to be counted. Looking at the current schedules of Moorestown, Ridgewood, and Summit, the following Moorestown opponents will be included: Georgetown Prep, Bridgewater-Raritan, Haddonfield, Rumson, Lawrenceville, Ridge, Ridgewood, and Mt. Sinai. These opponents won’t count: Hunterdon Central, Agnes Irwin, and Shawnee.
For Ridgewood, Georgetown Visitation, Morristown, Greenwich, Oak Knoll, Lawrenceville, Agnes Irwin, Summit, and Moorestown count while IMG Academy, Garden City, and Glen Ridge don’t.
Summit’s games against Glen Ridge, Mendham, Morristown, Georgetown Prep, Good Counsel, Mt. Lakes, Ridgewood, and IMG Academy will be included while their regular season and possible county tournament games against Oak Knoll won’t.
And oh, by the way, this is before Mother Nature weighs in. A game that was in the first 13 when the season started may get postponed or cancelled, which could cause a game or more outside the initial 13 to end up being counted for power point purposes.
Why only count the first 13 games? Under the LaxPower system, all games played up to the playoff cutoff date (May 8 this year) counted for seeding purposes. I imagine that’s to give whoever is counting the beans (no doubt using abaci) enough time to total up the points.
Lovelax, there is no factor for group size in the rules issued today. You certainly point out a potential weakness in the PP system. Was LaxPower a good way to seed teams (and better than power points)? I think so, but Mrs. Computer has retired. Is there a better way to seed than using power points? A committee of knowledgeable folks might be better in theory, but I can’t imagine it being feasible in practice. Arguing over which team should be 13 and which 14 in North II, Group 2? I love the sport, but no thanks. Maybe we can flush Rimback out on this one. He
might have an opinion on seeding.
I think it remains to be seen how well, or poorly, the power point seeding system will work for glax. My guess is it won’t have a huge impact. With pretty rare exceptions, the best teams in each of the 16 sections will still win their sections. After that, games are on neutral fields. Up to the TOC it will only determine which team wears its home jersey. TOC seeding could be impacted, of course, but to win the TOC, you have to beat two teams, whichever ones they may be.