Gramps Braggin' Rights Greater St. Louis Area Girls' Basketball Ratings - 2/07/2022

 I was looking over the Post Dispatch Large and Small school Girls' Basketball poll for week nine and just have to post my latest update for these fine teams.  I am going in for a pacemaker procedure this afternoon so I don't have a lot of time to comment but I do want to make a couple of comments.  

These polls, like the P-D and the MBCA poll, are just that... they are well-versed guesses by sportswriters and coaches as to the best teams.  My ratings are just that... Ratings using a mathematical model to assess a team's overall strength compared to common opponents and comparative scores.  So I do not mean to demean or belittle those polls, but I do hope that they will look at my ratings so that they don't overlook great teams.

The second comment is about what large and small schools are.  The P-D definition is greater than 1000 students is a large school and less than 1000 students is a small school, except for single-gender schools where the school size is doubled. So a boy's school like DeSmet, with about 750 male students, is considered a 1500 student population (if there were also girls attending).  I can live with that but when you have a school like Incarnate Word, with only 335 girls, but which is also a national powerhouse and in the largest class in Missouri, class six, then I don't like the definition.  So, contrary to the Post-Dispatch, I consider all girl's class six schools as large schools.

Finally, my definition of the Greater St. Louis area is anywhere I can get to in 60 minutes from downtown.  So a school like Okawville (hint, hint) is part of my ratings.  Okawville is too good to be left off the small school Post-Dispatch poll but I am not sure the writers who pull their poll together actually know where Okawville is located.  LOL Just Kidding.

So here are my large and small school ratings.  In the large schools, of course, I have the "small" school class six schools of Incarnate Word, St. Joseph's Academy, and Cor Jesu.  The P-D poll looks fairly similar to my statistically-based ratings.

In the small schools, as I alluded to previously, Okawville should be near the top of the list along with John Burroughs.  And God Bless the P-D for mentioning Marissa, Illinois, in their small school honorable mention but they are 73rd on my list.

I have to go pack for the hospital.  Enjoy.  I hope to be back on line in a couple of days.







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