By Tom Robinson, NEPASportsNation.com
District 2, in cooperation with two of its neighboring Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association districts, has altered plans for upcoming subregional basketball tournaments.
Schedules have been set for the tournaments involving the largest and smallest of the PIAA’s six classifications.
District 2 works with District 4, taking in Williamsport, for the District 2-4 Class 6A Subregionals each season.
With more teams involved, District 11 officials run the District 2-11 Class A Subregionals. MMI Prep and Susquehanna are Class A schools in both boys and girls basketball and are joined by the Forest City boys and Mountain View girls teams.
With Williamsport and Wilkes-Barre Area teams positioned to host semifinal games, but also serving as sites for district wrestling tournaments, a change has been made to the Class 6A schedule.
Originally announced as Feb. 24-25, the semifinals hosted by those schools will instead be played Feb. 27 in the Class 6A Subregionals.
NEPASportsNation.com had earlier reported that District 2 and 11 had agreed for the first time to allow the Class A Subregional championship games to be played at the Mohegan Sun Arena at Casey Plaza if District 2 had a finalist and it was the higher seed for the game.
The districts recently completed work on the rest of the Class A playoff format.
Unlike District 2, which allows for up to eight teams in all of the tournaments that contain only its teams, the District 2-11 Subregionals will feature six of the nine eligible teams in boys and just four of the eight in girls.
The District 2-11 Class A boys quarterfinals are scheduled for Feb. 25. The Class A boys and girls semifinals will not be played until Feb. 27, meaning District 2 and Mohegan Sun Arena at Casey Plaza officials will not know until less than 48 hours before the start of the championship series whether it will include 10, 11 or 12 games.
The Mountain View girls are in position to play at the arena if they win a semifinal as the top seed. The Forest City boys, who dropped to second in the seeding race, would need a semifinal win and an upset of the top seed.
In a change from previous seasons, District 2 only qualifies the champion for the state tournament in Class 2A this season. The District 2-4 Class 6A Subregional has picked up an extra qualifier to the state boys tournament.
The PIAA adjusts its state tournament brackets every two years for changes in the number of schools in each classification from each district by sport. The number of Class 2A teams in the district has been reduced by schools moving up and down according to the latest two-year review of enrollment figures.
MORE COVERAGE
District 2 baskeball championship plan: District 2 sets basketball format, schedule for arena championships – NEPA Sports Nation.
