central section leagues & playoff seedings

CIF Central Section Playoffs:
League Structures & Playoff Seedings--(Feb. 25, 1999)

For some time now we've been promising to update our coverage of Central Section of CIF and the teams playing there. Why? Well for one thing, the Central Section is not located in Northern California, despite the fact that everyone really believes anything north of the Tehachapis is NorCal. Nope, the Central Section, geography notwithstanding, is really located in Southern California. Really. The teams in the Central Section compete in the Southern California Regionals of the State Championship Tournament, and should one or more of them win in any of the five divisions (I, II, III, IV and V), that team or teams will be the representatives from Southern California on March 19 & 20 at ARCO Arena for the State Championship games.

Here's a list of the league placements for the 1998-99 year for teams in the Central Section of CIF:

CIF Central Section Sequoia Division
North League Chowchilla Coalinga Dos Palos Kerman Mendota Washington Union	Central League Dinuba Kingsburg San Joaquin Memorial Selma Sierra Yosemite	South League Arvin Shafter Taft Tehachapi Wasco	East League Corcoran Lindsay Parlier Orosi McFarland Woodlake
CIF Central Section Sierra Division
West League Caruthers Firebaugh Fowler Immanuel Riverdale Tranquility	East League Central Valley Christian Farmersville Fresno Christian Laton Strathmore Valley	Central League Alpaugh Chestnut Bakersfield Christian Fresno Adventist Kings Christian Northwest Heritage	Coast League Avenal Coast Union Mission Prep Templeton Kings Christian* *Football only
CIF Central Section Yosemite Division
TRAC League Buchanan Central Clovis Clovis West Madera Sanger	North League Bullard Edison Fresno Hoover McLane Roosevelt	West League Golden West Hanford Lemoore Mt. Whitney Redwood Reedley	South East League Bakersfield East Foothill Highland Ridgeview
	South West League Centennial North South Stockdale West	East League Delano Exeter Monache Porterville Tulare Union Tulare Western

We don't pretend to know a lot about most of these teams, but we've seen some of them several times this year either in Las Vegas at the Reebok Holiday Classic (actually that was last year, in December 1998, so don't get picky), and at the Best of the West Tournament. Several of these teams also traveled to other venues and we're generally pretty familiar with teams like Clovis West, Clovis, Edison, Fresno Washington Union and Bakersfield High.

Just like the leagues in Southern Section and San Diego Section, when it comes time for playoffs, league action ends and teams drop into their appropriate Divisions according to their "CBED" (California Board of Education) enrollment figures. We assume the cutoffs are the same as they are for Southern Section. But unlike Southern Section, the playoffs are just for overall divisions (i.e, I, II, III, IV and V), and given the relatively small number of schools, there's no need to further subdivide them into "AA" or "A".

So who are the hot teams this year? Well, we're not exactly sure of the overall league standings (the nice folks at the Central Section office were going to send them but we haven't received them yet), but here are the seedings of the teams in the various brackets for playoffs:

Division I

Division II

Division III

Division IV

Division V

1. Clovis West
2. Bakersfield
3. Ridgeview
4. West
5. Central
6. South
7. Hanford
8. Redwood
9. Centennial
10. Clovis
11. Hoover
12. Monache
13. Roosevelt
14. Buchanan
15. Delano
16. Golden West

"OutBracket"
i.e., wild cards:

Stockdale
Golden West
Delano
McLane

1. Edison
2. East
3. Highland
4. Tulare Western
5. Sanger
6. Tulare
7. Winner "B"
8. Winner "A"

Outbracket

"A"

Foothill
Reedley

"B"

North
Lemoore

1. Washington Union
2. Yosemite
3. Exeter
4. Dinuba
5. Shafter
6. Sierra

Both Washington &
Yosemite received
1st Round Byes

1. Chowchilla
2. Garces
3. Corcoran
4. Riverdale
5. Orosi
6. Kerman
7. Kingsburg
8. Firebaugh
9. Lindsey
10. McFarland
11. Templeton
12. Taft
13. SJM
14. Caruthers

Chowchilla & Garces
received 1st Round
Byes

1. Coast Union
2. Immanuel
3. CVC
4. Fresno Christian
5. Strathmore
6. Laton
7. Mission Prep
8. Kings Christian

Interestingly, Central Section seems to have the same problem that occurred in the Southern Section with Division III, i.e., there aren't a lot of schools who play in that division for playoff purposes, and only 6 teams (just like III-A here) qualified for the playoffs. Oh well. We'll be posting up the brackets for these playoff brackets shortly. In the meantime, one of our readers has posted up most (if not all) of the first round results in Central Section. from the first round games played yesterday in Divisions I, IV and the various "Outbracket" games. Most second round or quarterfinal games in every division will be played tomorrow night, as we all lurch towards the State Playoffs.