The Last Word - Comparing the Missouri Basketball Coaches Association poll to Gramps Braggin Rights ratings 3/26/2022
One of the disclaimers on the MBCA website is "If your team should be ranked, send an email and explain why. The goal is to promote teams, never to exclude!". My whole intent during the year in comparing MBCA polls to Gramps Braggin Rights ratings was not to embarrass anyone but to highlight teams that were worthy but missing from the MBCA poll.
I don't know if I accomplished that but their poll and my rankings match up pretty darn good at the end of the season. It may be that the state playoffs helped align my ratings with their poll, or maybe, Gramps ratings were on target with the play-offs and state championship games, and the coaches poll finally caught up.
It really does not matter as long as the right teams are somewhere in the MBCA poll and, for some teams, like class 5 Smithville's or class 3 West County Leadwoods' girls' teams, their fourth-place trophy takes precedent over being ranked 6th (in the MBCA poll) or 11th or 12th in Gramp's ratings. No one will remember the polls but they will see that nice trophy in the school trophy case.
Here are the links to all of the final Missouri boys and girls basketball ratings:
Boys All Boys Teams (by rank) All Boys Teams (alphabetical)
Class One Class Two Class Three Class Four Class Five Class Six
Girls All Girls Teams (by rank) All Girls Teams (alphabetical)
Class One Class Two Class Three Class Four Class Five Class Six
Listed below are the boys and girls Missouri Basketball Coaches polls (released 3/23) and my ratings for each ranked team, along with a "Who's Missing" section to highlight the teams that shoulda/coulda/woulda been in the MBCA poll. I will probably make some people angry with my frank evaluation but, quoting the village idiot, "it is what it is".
I will start with Girls:
Class One girls
Platte Valley (or South Nodaway with Conjunction Junction, as MSHSAA calls them) has some magic going and beat a good Delta team that was lambasting SE Missouri class 1 teams.
The MBCA class one girl's poll is pretty good but they have forgotten some very good teams.
Who's missing? How about St. Paul Lutheran Farmington (my #5), Linn County (#16), Tuscumbia (#17), and Pilot Grove (#20), IMHO.
I would rate Miller slightly better than St. Paul Lutheran Concordia, not to be confused with St. Paul Lutheran Farmington.
Who's missing in the MBCA poll? Try Santa Fe (my #11), North Platte (#15), Newburg (#18), Canton (#19), and Marion C Early (#20). A shout-out to all of you.
Class Three girls
The coaches pretty much nailed class three.
El Dorado Springs was no surprise to me. They were on top or near the top of my class three girl's ratings all year but I had Strafford and Skyline in my top five the entire year too. Strafford eliminated Skyline in district 11 or Skyline could have been a final four team. Strafford lost by only two to El Dorado Springs in the semi-final and blew out South Shelby by 35 in the final. South Shelby is a solid #4 in my book behind Skyline.
West County Leadwood was the fourth-place team in the state playoffs and no one can take away their trophy but I already wrote about why I rated the #11 in my rankings. The MBCA coaches put them at #6. Now West County folks can be mad at MBCA and me.
Who's missing in the MBCA class three? Shout-outs to #14 Hartville, #16 Hermann, #17 Montgomery County, #18 Scott City, #19 Liberty Mountain View, and #20 St. Pius X of Festus.
Class Four girls
The coaches pretty much have the top ten teams in class four but not necessarily in the order I would rate them. I had Cardinal Ritter as my #2 for a number of reasons, not even considering they lost to Burroughs by four points, the closest margin of all of Burroughs wins. Ritter played a tough schedule and was one of the few teams to keep undefeated class six powerhouse Incarnate Word to a 10 point deficit. Most teams lost to the Red Knights by 25 or more points.
Benton was outstanding with a 25-6 record and split wins with Helias, winning the second game by five after losing by two at home in their first meeting. All three of the teams behind Burroughs, including Westminster Christian Academy, were tight in the ratings. Put them in a hat, pick one. The game results suggested Ritter was that pick.
Who did the coaches miss? my #12 Chillicothe, #17 Orchard Farm, #19 Kirksville and #20 Blair Oaks, all had good, solid seasons and within five rating points of Ava at #8.
Class Five girls
There were doubters in St. Louis, but both the MBCA poll and my rating had the Zizzers on top of the class five girls since early February. An early fluke loss to class four Fair Grove, a two point loss to class three powerhouse Strafford, and a close loss to class six elites Nixa and a 21 point loss to Kickapoo, were the only blemishes on a 27-4 season. West Plains went 9-0 down the stretch, the place most teams want to get hot, and hot they were. The Zizzers turned the table on Whitfield, winning the title by 13 after Whitfield had beaten them by 16 last year.
As much as I admired Smithville's boys and girls run into the playoffs, I believe there were at least seven teams better than the fourth-place Warriors. Smithville got a trophy, but Rolla, Cape Notre Dame, Lift for Life, MICDS, Farmington, Lutheran St. Charles and Carl Junction were higher rated in my rankings.
Who was missing in the coaches' poll? my #15 Union, #17 Willard, #18 Warrenton, #19 Camdenton and #20 Parkview needed an honorable mention.
Here are the boy's MBCA polls with my "Who's Missing" comment section:
Class One boys
The coaches poll and my ratings match up well, with South Iron the clear #1. The only school that is not listed, but should, be is Macks Creek, my #13 team, otherwise, we would be splitting hairs arguing over the placement of the top 20.
Class Two boys
The MBCA is well-aligned with my ratings but I think Alton should be the #3 team instead of Putnam Co. and Bishop LeBlond.
Who's missing? Gallatin and Gainesville both had good seasons and should be in their honorable mention group.
Class Three boys
The class three MBCA poll is darn close to my final ratings, except for Duchesne. Duchesne had a great season-ending run to the final four but also had a 15-17 record and were my #19 team. Hat's off to them and please keep that fourth place trophy polished.
Who's missing? St. Pius X KC, Kingston, and Steelville all deserve discussion but they were MIA in the coaches' poll.
Class Four boys
Was there a better final than the Vashon - Tolton game? Well, maybe a Tolton - Blair Oaks or Vashon-Blair Oaks final might have been just as good.
The coaches had New Madrid as #3, but as good as New Madrid County Central was, Blair Oaks, ousted by Tolton in their district final, was my clear #3 team. And the coaches should not forget about KC Center, John Burroughs (first-year coach PeeWee Lenard), Soldan, Confluence Academy, and Park Hills Central. These were great teams that might have been in the elite eight with a better district draw.
Class Five boys
The coaches' poll seems to want to put the final four in the top four slots in every poll. I don't agree with that philosophy because of the way the MSHSAA brackets are set up, a team can skate through a weak bracket and the best teams might face each other in an earlier round, or worse yet, in a district game.
Helias Catholic, with an 18-14 record, had a nice season, took home a class 5 runner-up trophy, but were not nearly as good as Cardinal Ritter, Westminster, or DeSmet, who beat them by 35 points. Helias lost to Webster in the championship game by 19 after the Statesmen had just gotten by Ritter by two in the semi-final. Helias is a fine #10 rank in my book, so I don't mean to belittle their accomplishments but I have to look at each team's full season performance and not the last five games when I rate them. The only time I would do that is when a team wins the state championship after a mediocre season. That hypothetical team would get a #1 with heavy weighting of their rating the last few games.
Other teams that deserve mention include Vianney, the best 14-15 team in the state, 23 game winner St. Dominic, and Smithville, who has seen a tremendous improvement under Coach Eric Bennaka.
Class Six boys
No one can deny the season CBC had but they were beatable at times when Martin and Hughes jr were both cold shooting. They were both ON down the stretch. Nixa, Staley, Kickapoo, Liberty, Blue Springs and Chaminade were not too far behind CBC and then teams trailed off in team rating. Throw them all in a hat and any one of them might have been state champ in 2022, but Coach Tatum had the Cadets ready for anything and they took care of business.
MBCA coaches tend forget how hard class six district eight was this year. North Kansas City belongs in the MBCA top ten along with Lee's Summit, who isn't listed as an honorable mention. Park Hill (#11 in my rating) and Park Hill South (#14) are other worthy top 15 teams and Parkway West is my #16 team and is another team ignored in the coaches' poll.
Lee's Summit West had a nice stretch run after an 11-13 regular season, ending up class six district 6 champ with a four point win over Lee's Summit, but getting blasted by Nixa by 24 in the elite eight (which is close to the spread I predicted). West is my #22 team, no where near the top 10, let alone #5. Lee's Summit is still my #10 team, even with the district final loss to West.
So that's my take on the Missouri Coaches poll. Their polling improved from the beginning to the end of the season and I don't know if that is because the best teams in my ratings ended up doing well in the state playoffs or if they were reading my blog before they voted? LOL
Just kidding.
For the most part, the coaches' poll found and recognized the best teams. Another season done and done.
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