County schools stay (mostly) close to home
OSSAA BASKETBALL PLAYOFF ASSIGNMENTS
Kingfisher County has three No. 1-ranked teams in Classes B-II and A.
As a result, those teams are being rewarded with most of their basketball playoffs at home - or close to home.
The OSSAA on Saturday released the basketball playoff assignments for the three smallest classes: A, B-I and B-II.
In the county, that includes Okarche in Class A and Dover and Lomega in B-II.
All three schools will host a district championship.
Two of them - Okarche and Dover - are regional hosts while Lomega will be playing in the Dover regional after first being a sub-site in the opening round.
Lomega features the No. 1 girls team while the Raiders are tied for 16th.
They will host Carney in the district and will be joined by Cimarron and Taloga in the opening round of the regional.
Dover’s boys are ranked No. 1.
Dover hosts Gracemont in the district. Gracemont’s girls are ranked 17th.
The regional opener will see those schools joined by Mulhall-Orlando and Oilton before the final two days of the regional will feature the schools at Lomega.
As for the girls, sixthranked Smithville is the other top-eight team in the area.
The other regional also features No. 10 Eagletown and No. 18 Moyers.
On the boys’ side, Battiest is the highest-ranked team at No. 6 in the other regional.
Eagletown is No. 13 while Cimarron, a potential regional opener for Lomega, is 19th.
Those two regionals will meet up for the area tournament at Henryetta.
Okarche features two top-eight teams.
The Warriors are No. 1 and the two-time defending state champs.
Okarche’s girls are currently ranked No. 5.
The teams will host Cherokee in a district and then will be joined by Laverne and Tipton to open the regional.
The other teams in the regional are Arapaho-Butler, Pioneer-Pleasant Vale, Mooreland and Drummond.
Arapaho’s girls are ranked 20th while the boys are 17th.
The bottom half of the area sees the Amber-Pocasset girls at No. 4 as the other top-eight team. It also features No. 16 Waukomis.
The other top-eight boys team is No. 6 Riverfield. Waukomis is No. 10.
The two regionals will play their area tournament at Enid High School.
PLAYOFF CHANGES
In addition to there being an additional class this year (B-II), there is also a change to the schedule of games.
In B-II, district tournaments will begin on Thursday, Feb. 12, if there are more than two teams and the district championship games will be Friday Feb. 13.
Class A (it only has twoteam districts) will play all of its championships on Saturday, Feb. 14.
Traditionally, all classes played their district finals on the Saturday.
The changes don’t stop there.
District champs will play their regional openers the following Tuesday, Feb. 17, at the sub-sites and main sites.
The district runners-up will begin their regionals on the traditional Thursday, Feb. 19.
The regionals for those classes will resume at the main site on Feb. 20-21, so teams that win their regional winner’s bracket opener on a Tuesday won’t play again until Saturday.
The area tournaments will follow the traditional Thursday-Friday-Saturday format (Feb. 26-28).
The state tournaments for those three classes will be March 3-7.
Class B-II will have its state quarterfinal games Tuesday, March 3. The semifinals will be on Friday and the championship game on Saturday of that week.
Class A will play quarterfi nal games Wednesday, March 4, with semifinals and finals on Friday and Saturday, respectively.
Following are the complete area assignments for the county teams in B-II and A:
Class B-II Area III
District 1 - Lomega, Carney District 2 - Mulhall-Orlando, Oilton District 3 - Dover, Gracemont District 4 - Cimarron, Taloga
Regional sub-site Lomega (Districts 1, 4) Regional main site Dover District 5 - Kinta, Battiest, Hanna (girls only) District 6 - Eagletown, Wapanucka District 7 - Coleman, Moyers District 8 - Smithville, Buffalo Valley Regional sub-site - Battiest (Districts 5, 8) Regional main site Coleman Area site - Henryetta
Class A Area I
District 1 - Arapaho-Butler, Pioneer-Pleasant Vale District 2 - Okarche, Cherokee District 3 - Laverne, Tipton District 4 - Mooreland, Drummond Regional sub-site Mooreland (Districts 1, 4) Regional main site Okarche District 5 - Riverfield, Regent Prep District 6 - Waukomis, Barnsdall District 7 - Drumright, Hominy District 8 - Amber-Pocasset, Yale Regional subsite - Yale (Districts 5, 8) Regional main site Drumright Area site - Enid High School