Thought we would take a nice Sunday afternoon to lay out the first attempt at breaking down the Class 3A state tournament.  To do so, we use current conference rankings to determine district qualifiers and then RPI from Sunday January 27th to determine the remaining qualifiers.
The post-season format calls for seven district tournaments with the top two in each automatically qualifying for the 32-team state tournament.  The remaining 18 qualifiers are then determined by RPI standings.  District champs earn the right to host a regional ONLY if they’re in the Top 16 of RPI.  That will play a major role in Class 3A as currently there are three conference leaders that are not in the top 16 (Middle Park, Bayfield and DSST-Byers).
To determine our automatic qualifiers, we had to break some ties and we used head-to-head where available and if not, then the criteria was overall record.  Teams with the better record earned the higher spot in our scenario.  With that in mind, here are the top two qualifiers from each district based on conference record and tie breakers:

  • Frontier:  Middle Park #1, DSST-Stapleton #2 (Middle Park better record)
  • Patriot:  Sterling #1, Resurrection Christian #2 (Rez a better overall record than Strasburg)
  • Metro:  Manual #1, Kent Denver #2 (tied with Lutheran & Faith but has the best record)
  • Tri Peaks:  Vanguard #1, Lamar #2 (Lamar and CSCS are tied for 2nd but Lamar won head to head)
  • Intermountain:  Bayfield #1, Montezuma Cortez (#2) — (Cortez is tied with Pagosa and Alamosa but has best record overall)
  • Western Slope:  Delta #1, Gunnison #2 (Cowboys tied with Roaring Fork and Grand Valley but have best record)
  • Confluence:  DSST-Byers #1, DSST-Green Valley #2 (Green Valley is tied with Ridgeview Academy but won head to head)

So the district champs in our scenario are Middle Park, Sterling, Manual, Vanguard, Bayfield, Delta and DSST-Byers.  Of that group only four are in the top RPI as of today (Jan 27th):  (Sterling, Manual, Delta, Vanguard).  The other teams make the field but are placed in the bracket based on RPI meaning that Kent Denver, Coal Ridge, Faith Christian and Colorado Springs Christian would be non-champions that will host regionals in our bracket (based on RPI).
DSST-Byers (#34) and DSST-Green Valley (#49) are also not in the top 32 of RPI but they qualify since they’re the automatic qualifiers from the Confluence league.  So they get into the field and thus would bump La Junta (#31) and Olathe (#32) from the field as the last two quailfiers.
Once the qualifiers are set, the teams are then placed in the bracket by RPI.  Teams can be moved based on head-to-head competition and common opponents and teams from the same league likely won’t be paired up in round one.  Teams in positions 25-32 could also be moved for geography and travel purposes.  For our bracket, we simply true seed based on RPI.
 
 

CLASS 3A BRACKET – Projected

 
REGION ONE

#1 Sterling  
#32 DSST-Green Valley  
#16 Alamosa  
#17 Eaton  

 
REGION EIGHT

#8 Vanguard  
#25 St Mary’s  
#9 Resurrection Christian  
#24 Jefferson Academy  

 
REGION FOUR

#4 Coal Ridge  
#29 Strasburg  
#13 Lamar  
#20 Grand Valley  

 
REGION FIVE

#5 Faith Christian  
#28 Frontier Academy  
#12 Centauri  
#21 University  

 
REGION THREE

#3 Kent Denver  
#30 Fort Lupton  
#14 Pagosa Springs  
#19 Bayfield (likely moved)  

 
REGION SIX

#6 Colorado Springs Christian  
#27 Platte Valley  
#11 Montezuma Cortez  
#22 Gunnison  

 
REGION SEVEN

#7 Delta  
#26 DSST-Stapleton  
#10 Lutheran  
#23 Middle Park  

 
REGION TWO

#2 Manual  
#31 DSST-Byers  
#15 Colorado Academy  
#18 Roaring Fork