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Looking at the Girls 4A State Tournament Bracket has me thinking; can there be a better system for seeding the eight State Tournament teams?

Before presenting my solution, let’s take a look at how the TSSAA currently decides on the way teams are seeded.

Under the State Tournament Section of the TSSAA handbook, it is stated that, “Drawing for play at the central tournament site shall be made following the sectional games. The draw shall be

made so that two teams from the same region will be drawn to opposite brackets.”

No other details are provided in the handbook for how teams are seeded, but upon further research, I found that a blind draw is used to determine which substate winners go where in the bracket before the Sectional Games take place.

After the dust cleared on Saturday night’s sectional round, the State Tournament bracket shaped up like this:

Top side:

Game 1: Oak Ridge Vs Bartlett

Game 2: Cookeville Vs Lincoln County

Bottom side:

Game 3: Bearden Vs Whitehaven

Game 4: Coffee County Vs Bradley Central

I understand the sentiment behind keeping regional opponents on separate sides. Afterall, who wants to see a repeat of what happened in the previous round, but this year’s lop-sided bracket proves that we need a new system.

For context, let’s look at the most recent TSWA statewide rankings that were released on Monday, March. 3: 1. Bradley Central, 2. Coffee County, 3. Bearden, 4. Oak Ridge, 5. Blackman, 6. Morristown East, 7. Lincoln County, 8. Cleveland, 9. Brentwood, 10. Sevier County.

This means that the consensus top three teams in the state are all on the same side of the bracket, with the top two (Bradley Central and Coffee County) facing each other in the first round. Does that sound fair to you? Well as Lady Raider Coach Joe Pat Cope said after Saturday night’s sectional win, “…I bet Auburn isn’t going to play Duke in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.”

Of course, griping without coming up with a solution isn’t going to solve anything, so I came up with my own system.

I took all eight of the State Tournament teams from Class 4A, calculated each of their winning percentages against fellow 4A teams that they’ve played during the season, then multiplied that number by the average winning percentage of those same Class 4A opponents.

For example, Coffee County’s winning percentage against Class 4A teams this year was 1.000 or 100%, but the average winning percentage of their Class 4A opponents was .502, or a little over 50%. Multiply these two numbers and you get .502.

Here’s how the eight teams rank with these calculations:

1. Oak Ridge: .546 (.920 x .593)

2. Bartlett: .517 (.818 x .632)

3. Bearden: .516 (.917 x .563)

4. Coffee County: .502 (1.00 x .502)

5. Bradley Central: .494 (1.00 x .494)

6. Cookeville: .449 (.800 x .561)

7. Whitehaven: .435 (.778 x .559)

8. Lincoln County: .386 (.700 x .551)

As you can tell, this isn’t quite perfect, because in a typical eight-team bracket, teams are seeded No. 1 Vs No. 8 and No. 4 Vs No. 5 on the top side and No. 2 Vs No. 7 and No. 3 Vs No. 6 on the bottom side, meaning that Coffee County would still face Bradley Central in the first round.

However, there’s another element that I think we could introduce to this scenario; who placed first in their region and who placed second?

With that in mind, I made the top four Region Champions from the previous list the top four seeds in the State Tournament:

1. Oak Ridge (R2 Champions)

2. Bartlett (R8 Champions)

3. Coffee County (R5 Champions)

4. Bradley Central (R3 Champions)

For seeds No. 5-8, I sorted the remaining teams based purely on the calculations from the first list:

5. Bearden (R2 Runners-up)

6. Cookeville (R4 Champions)

7. Whitehaven (R8 Runners-up)

8. Lincoln County (R5 Runners-up)

With the teams now reseeded, here’s how the bracket would theoretically shake up:

Top side:

Game 1: Oak Ridge Vs Lincoln County

Game 2: Bradley Central Vs Bearden

Bottom side:

Game 3: Bartlett Vs Whitehaven

Game 4: Coffee County Vs Cookeville

The only problem I would have with this is that Bradley Central and Bearden (No. 1 and No. 3 in the recent Statewide Rankings) would face each other in the first round. Bartlett would also face Whitehaven in a rematch of the Region 8 Championship, but I don’t think it’s unfair to have two region teams playing against each other again in the State Tournament if the teams are seeded where they should be.

Overall, I don’t think my solution is completely perfect, but it could be used as a good starting point, and I think that these eight teams deserve a more respectable system than what’s currently in place.