A New Look To Division 1 Sectionals
I decided to take a closer look at the sectionals for the 2019 postseason and thought I could do a little bit of rearranging. This is just a scenario, this is not any type of official document. However, when looking at the sections for this upcoming year, there were a few things I didn’t quite realize. I was shocked at some of the Northern schools had enrollment high enough to be considered Division 1. I’ve driven Highway 29 plenty of times across the state and I know a lot of these schools draw from a large area but didn’t think a high school such as Merrill, with an enrollment of nearly 900 students would be in the same division as schools that are more than double their size.
This scenario of sectionals would be similar to how Iowa assembles regionals (I’ll use a Nebraska scenario next week). It definitely caters to the top teams, but don’t most postseasons in order to get the top teams at the state tournament? I took different chunks of regionals and thought for some of the sections, an extreme East/West matchup could determine who would go to state with more neutral sites. As for the Milwaukee/SE Wisconsin area, I thought of taking four sections and put the top three teams from the area in separate sections. I know there will be some crossover, but if a team from Kenosha is bothered by a drive to Arrowhead, some of the Northern schools are driving two hours for a sectional game (Wausau to River Falls is almost 2.5 hours, most drives in section one could be at least 90 minutes).
I know postseason matchups aren’t going to make everyone happy, but working with different scenarios is a start to a good dialogue to have a blend of teams from across the state as well as the very best state competing on Wisconsin high school volleyball’s largest stage. I know there are teams that are crossing paths, the purpose of this is to see sections in a different way that could lead to the separating the top teams to get the best matchups at the state tournament.
* top two or three seed in section
Section 1 Sub Section 1 Ashwaubenon *Bay Port DC Everest Green Bay Preble Green Bay Southwest Pulaski Wausau West Wausau East
Sub Section 2 Chippewa Falls Hudson Eau Claire North Eau Claire Memorial Merrill Menomonie New Richmond *River Falls Superior |
Section 2 *Appleton North Appleton East Appleton West DePere Kaukauna *Kimberly Hortonville Marshfield Menasha Manitowoc Lincoln SPASH Neenah Sheboygan North Sheboygan South West DePere Wisconsin Rapids Lincoln |
Section 3 Beaver Dam *Cedarburg DeForest Fond du Lac Hartford Middleton Oshkosh North Oshkosh West Port Washington Slinger Sun Prairie Tomah *Watertown West Bend West West Bend East |
Section 4 Sub-Section 1 La Crosse Central Holmen Onalaska Madison East Madison LaFollette Madison West Madison Memorial *Verona
Sub-Section 2 *Burlington Beloit Janesville Parker Janesville Craig Milton Oregon Stoughton Waunakee |
Section 5 *Oconomowoc *Pewaukee *Waukesha West Homestead Janesville Craig Janesville ParkerMilwaukee Riverside Racine Park Fort Atkinson Monona Grove Wauwatosa East Waukesha North Waukesha South |
Section 6 *Arrowhead *Germantown *Wauwatosa West Elkhorn Greendale Greenfield Milwaukee Pulaski Milwaukee Hamilton Milwaukee Washington Muskego Oak Creek Westosha Central Wilmot Union
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Section 7 *DSHA *Brookfield Central *Mukwonago Brookfield East Menomonee Falls Milwaukee King Milwaukee Ronald Reagan Milwaukee Arts Milwaukee Bradley Tech Nicolet Whitefish Bay |
Section 8 *Union Grove *Kettle Moraine *Hamilton Waterford Franklin Kenosha Bradford Kenosha Tremper Kenosha Indian Trail Race Case Racine Horlick West Allis Central West Allis Hale |