I was not aware that GA high schools have mandated state co-champs in all its HS sports. No shootouts, PKs to declare one winner...........
Mad About… mandated co-champs
By Darryl Maxie | Monday, January 8, 2007, 11:26 AM
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
It has been a few weeks now since the unprecedented occurred — two championship ties in the same Georgia High School Association season. But the pattern remains the same.
First, there are the fans who watch the clock drain away and sit in anticipation for the overtime that never comes. Followed, of course, by the same befuddlement that accompanies a balk call at a major league game. Fans spend all game clamoring for a balk and then when it happens, they say, “What just happened?”
So it is when co-champions are announced to a smattering of boos.
Then, of course, there’s the ceremonial handwringing. The “we’ve-got-to-do-something-about-this” indignation fades into the “well-if-they-couldn’t-settle-it-in-48-minutes” cop out which then fades into some lawmaker thinking, “Hey, here’s an opportunity to score political points,” which ultimately winds up back at the fans’ “When does spring practice begin again?”
And it’s all forgotten until it happens again. What do we need to get real action on this? Five championship ties in the same season?
Why, in what is supposed to be the most important game of the season, in high school sports’ marquee event, is a tie good enough? Five weeks of playoff buildup, including a trip to the Georgia Dome, peters out into let’s-everybody-go-home-happy rhetoric. If everybody going home happy is the goal, why have the playoffs at all? Spread the happiness a little thinner, why don’t we?
The rule dates to 1948, but its use has been so infrequent as to make it seem like it’s stood the test of time for 59 years.
“Just because it was good enough for grandpa in 1948 doesn’t mean it’s good enough for us in 2007,” state Sen. John Douglas told the Rockdale Citizen.
That’s the point. It wasn’t good enough in 1948. Or 1958, when Avondale and Thomasville tied. Or 1978, when Griffin and Valdosta tied.
And it won’t be good enough in 2008, which is when I’m betting the status quo next gets questioned. When does spring practice begin again?
http://www.ghsa.net/index.php?q=node/177
