The GHSA on Monday postponed the start of the state basketball tournament one day until Wednesday, Feb. 19, to accommodate region tournaments that might run into next week because of the weather.
Region tournaments, scheduled to finish Saturday, now may hold championship games on Monday if necessary.
Cobb, Fulton, DeKalb and Atlanta city school systems have canceled after-school activities for this afternoon, which will delay the start of several region tournaments.
GHSA associate director Ernie Yarbrough, who coordinates basketball, said he would move the deadline for finishing the region tournaments until Tuesday if several days were wiped out this week by the forecast of snow. But there must be a day of rest between the end of region tournaments and the start of the state tournament, so Tuesday would be the latest possible play date for region tournaments.
Yarbrough noted that each of the first three rounds of the state tournament is a two-day event, one day with girls games, the other for boys games. Pushing the tournament back would never force a team to play two games in two nights, even if the first round were Wednesday-Thursday and the second round were Friday-Saturday of next week.
‘’Coaches would still have that day in between games for practice and preparation,’’ Yarbrough said. “This time of year, coaches don’t like lot of time between games any way.’’
Yarbrough also said that regions could elect not to finish a tournament and seed based on the regular-season finish if necessary. Each region sends four qualifiers to the state tournament except in Class A, which qualifies teams based on a power rating.
‘’We really allow the regions a lot of latitude in how they determine those top four seeds,’’ Yarbrough said. “A few region secretaries have already called and said they’re working on contingency plans.’’
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