During a recent visit to Bellwood-Antis High School to cover a basketball game, I noticed a banner honoring the 2019-2020 girls basketball team for making the Elite 8 in a season that was never completed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

It was hanging next to the Lady Blue Devils’ two state championship banners from the two previous seasons and the same size and just as prominent.

Obviously not all the teams that were still playing when the PIAA shut down the season in 2020 would have won a PIAA championship, but I would like to see all of them honored the way B-A and some other schools have.

It’s often been said that unless you miss the playoffs entirely, only one team gets to finish the season with a victory. That wasn’t the case that year, and the teams that were still playing like the B-A girls, Bishop Guilfoyle girls, Tyrone girls, Cambria Heights girls, Bishop Carroll boys and Bishop Guilfoyle boys deserve to be celebrated alongside all of the other quarterfinalists in the state that year.

Success formula update

After passing through the first two readings, the PIAA voted down eliminating the transfer aspect from its success formula that pushes teams up in classification if they accumulate enough points during a two-year cycle and have either one transfer (basketball) or three (football).

Many of the high school football teams facing moving up, including Southern Columbia (2A) and Aliquippa (4A) won their appeals against the PIAA despite having enough points to be forced up, leading in part to the organization to introduce new language that would force a team up regardless of how many transfers or how little transfers they had.

Fortunately, that was struck down at the PIAA’s December meeting in its third reading.

It’s simply not fair if a school naturally comes across success due to a very talented group of kids that win a lot in two years, and after they graduate, the kids after them are punished playing up against bigger competition.

What should be addressed somehow in the future is that student-athletes can transfer to a school in seventh or eighth grade and not count toward the transfer part of the formula.

A bad look

Also at its December meeting, the PIAA approved high school athletes getting name, image and likeness deals.

I understand that many high school athletes have jobs thus should be eligible to earn just like anyone else that a company wants to use to promote its product.

However, according to a report from Johnstown’s Tribune-Democrat, Bishop McCort freshmen wrestlers Bo Bassett and Jax Forrest were two of the first athletes in District 6 to secure deals, Forrest with CFLWR Combat Gear, and Bassett with a recovery company called Ice Barrel.

I’m not questioning the kids or that they are taking advantage of an opportunity that seems to be 100 percent legitimate.

It just feels strange seeing it begin in this area with a team already on probation due to alleged violations of the PIAA’s rules regarding transfers and recruiting and that is currently ineligible for the postseason.

District 6 loses spots

There will be less teams from District 6 in the PIAA basketball playoffs this season.

On the boys side, the district lost a state qualifier in Class 4A, 3A and 2A. On the girls side, there will be one less team advancing in 5A, 4A and 3A but one additional team from the 6A subregional with District 8 and District 10.

I reached out to District 6 chairman Bill Marshall to explain why this can happen as we enter new two-year cycles.

“The PIAA takes the percentage of schools by district that are in each classification,” Marshall said. “Then they multiply that by 16, because that’s the number of qualifiers that can go into the state playoffs. So, how many boys single-A basketball teams are there in District 6? If it’s 20 teams out of 200, then it’s 10 percent times 16, which is 1.6 and they usually round up, so we would get two qualifiers in that situation. There’s a very specific process and calculation that the PIAA uses to determine the number of qualifiers that are issued to each athletic district for the state tournament.”

While the district may have less teams move on, I do believe there is a strong chance District 6 returns to Hershey for a state championship appearance this year after no teams made it past the PIAA semifinals a year ago.

Michael Boytim can be reached at mboytim@altoonamirror.com or 814-946-7521. Follow him on Twitter@BoytimMichael