(This is a column of opinion by Curtis Rockwell, Sports Director of SouthMiss6 Sports)
A veritable plethora of prep basketball madness descends on the state of Mississippi next week, just as it does annually in early February.
Over 40 different region tournaments will be spread across the state as teams vie for berths in the upcoming state playoffs, as well as postseason seeding.
In the “Southern Six”, 48 squads will be in action in six separate classifications with various south state playoff spots up for grabs. And while most of the teams involved will be in traditional tournament formats, that apparently won’t be the case in the top classification.

Although the Region 4-7A pairings won’t be officially released until Saturday morning, several coaches in that league have contacted SouthMiss6 Sports this week to voice their opposition in the way some think the format will be utilized.
For the first time ever, Region 4-7A has seven teams comprising the league, and that is the only loop in the state with that many teams. So, obviously, the traditional six team format where the top two teams automatically get opening round byes was not expected to be employed, but instead most all the coaches thought that just the top team on each side of the boy’s and girl’s brackets would earn a bye and the other six would match up in the opening round to fight for spots in the semifinal round with the respective number one seeds.
That format has been followed across the state at times over the past our decades when needed.
But all that changed recently.
Earlier this week, several head coaches informed us that a new tourney bracket had been devised that would give opening round byes to both the top two seeds in each bracket and therefore, force the sixth and seventh seeds to face off in what are basically “play-in” games on Monday night with the winners moving on to the quarterfinal rounds.

While this would, like in the rest of Class 7A and all of Class 6A and 5A across the state, reward the top two seeds with opening round byes and the ensuing automatic berths in the upcoming state playoffs, it would also decrease the importance of being the top seed in an unbalanced region.

But, more importantly, it would force the winners of those “play-in” games to unfairly have to win two games in tournament play to reach the playoffs as well
Those teams would be the St. Martin and Harrison Central boys squads as well as the Ocean Springs and D’Iberville girls teams.
NO other region in the entire state requires any of its teams to win two games in the region tournament to earn a state playoff berth.
In a six team region, such as the other three Class 7A leagues in the state as well as all four in Class 6A and Class 5A, the bottom four seeds all face off in the opening round with berths in the semifinal round as well as state playoff spots on the line.

Region 8-4A, Region 8-3A and Region 8-1A are all five team regions where the top three seeds earn byes and automatic state playoff bids while the fourth and fifth seeds on each side of the ledger battle it out on the first day of the tourney with a chance to join the other three teams in the semifinals.
Four boys and four girls teams from every region qualify for the state playoffs.
So, the question is, why would a coach or coaches in Region 4-7A design a tournament format that would force two teams to win two region tournament games and not just one like every other league across the state to reach the state playoffs?
The 14 head coaches in Region 4-7A will meet in D’Iberville Saturday morning to vote on which format to use next week at the region tournament, which will also take place at DHS.
So, at this point, the who, what and where is all we really do know about the event at this point. The “Why?”, if two teams are forced to win double the amount of games than any other teams in the state to get in the state playoffs, may never be adequately answered.
(This is a column of opinion by Curtis Rockwell, Sports Director of SouthMiss6 Sports)