The Path to State

Oct 05, 2013

It's a long, and sometimes difficult, path to state. Here is an explanation of who will make it. Photo by Alan Versaw.

Lately, my e-mail inbox has been spilling over with the question of how a team or how individuals qualify for state. That must mean it's time to write an article about that. So, here we go...

The path to state varies a little by classification. So, we'll treat each classification separately and in turn.

2A

There are four 2A regions. Each region will qualify 40% of the complete teams that finish the regional race. Rounding follows the conventional rules of rounding you all learned in fourth grade. So, for example, if a region has nine complete boys teams finishing the regional race, 40% of those teams (3.6 round up to 4) will advance to state.

So, what's a complete team? A complete team, for 2A purposes, is a team with three or more runners. Three runners are required to have a team score.

Here is a quick breakdown by region:

2A Region 1 Boys - The following schools appear to have complete teams: Lyons, Liberty Common, Wiggins, Alexander Dawson, Resurrection Christian, Yuma, Highland, and Shining Mountain Waldorf. If this holds through regionals, the top three teams will qualify for state

2A Region 1 Girls - The following schools appear to have complete teams: Resurrection Christian, Lyons, Nederland, Shining Mountain Waldorf, Alexander Dawson, Yuma, Liberty Common, Highland, Wiggins. If this holds through regionals, the top four teams will qualify for state.

2A Region 2 Boys - The following schools appear to have complete teams: Heritage Christian Academy, Vanguard, Denver Academy, Peyton, SkyView Academy, Lutheran, Pikes Peak Christian, Front Range Christian, Evangelical Christian Academy, Colorado Springs School, Denver Waldorf, Denver Christian. If this holds through regionals, the top five teams will qualify for state.

2A Region 2 Girls - The following schools appear to have complete teams: Heritage Christian Academy, Denver Christian, Vanguard, Lutheran, SkyView Academy, Peyton, Pikes Peak Christian, Front Range Christian, Colorado Springs School, Evangelical Christian Academy, Kiowa, Denver Academy. If this holds through regionals, the top five teams will qualify for state.

2A Region 3 Boys - The following schools appear to have complete teams: Rocky Ford, Custer County, Rye, Del Norte, Center, Sargent, South Baca, Moffat. If this holds through regionals, the top three teams will qualify for state.

2A Region 3 Girls - The following schools appear to have complete teams: Sargent, Custer County, Rocky Ford, Moffat, Centennial, South Baca, Antonito, La Veta, Center. This, by the way, is huge growth for this region over last year. If this holds through regionals, the top four teams will qualify for state.

2A Region 4 Boys - The following schools appear to have complete teams: Crested Butte, Telluride, Hotchkiss, Mancos, Paonia, Ouray, Rangely, Meeker, Lake City, DeBeque. If this holds through regionals, the top four teams will qualify for state.

2A Region 4 Girls - The following schools appear to have complete teams: Hotchkiss, Paonia, Crested Butte, Mancos, Meeker, Lake City, Rangely, Dolores. If this holds through regionals, the top three teams will qualify for state.

Individuals - Any individuals finishing in the top 15 of the regional race qualify for state. In addition, if a team places more than five of its runners in the top 15, the sixth and seventh runners from that team will be "removed" from the top 15 for the purposes of qualifying individuals for state.

Back-door state qualifying - A team that does not qualify for state by conventional means might qualify a scoring team (three or more members), by placing at least three runners in the top 15. With the growth in the 2A ranks this year, however, that prospect looks rather unlikely for any of the regions at this time.

3A

State qualifying is a lot easier to explain for classifications 3A and up. There is a fixed number of teams qualifying from each region (regardless of the size of the region, a consideration that is more relevant to 3A than 4A or 5A).

In 3A, the top five teams from each of four regions will advance to state. Currently, the number of complete teams in each region appears to be as follows:

3A Region 1 Boys - 9

3A Region 1 Girls - 8

3A Region 2 Boys - 14

3A Region 2 Girls - 14

3A Region 3 Boys - 12

3A Region 3 Girls - 12

3A Region 4 Boys - 11

3A Region 4 Girls - 11

Any individuals not on a qualifying team who place in the top 15 at the regional race will qualify for state as individuals. In addition, if any team places more than six runners in the top 15, the sixth and seventh runners are "removed" for purposes of qualifying individuals for state.

I believe back-door qualifying for state is theoretically possible in 3A Region 1, but it is a very remote possibility. Better to get to state through conventional means than to count on this particular species of miracle.

4A

Two years ago, the CHSAA cross country committee created six 4A regions so that all regions could be of comparable size without committing any schools to unrealistic travel for regional meets. Last year, five teams from each regional meet qualified for state, but that led to an unwieldy state field of 30 teams. This year, the number of team qualifiers from each region has been reduced to four, so there will be 24 teams at state.

Any individuals not on qualifying teams who finish in the top 15 at the regional race will qualify for state as individuals. At the 4A level, it is highly unlikely that any team will place more than seven runners in the top 15, but, should that occur, the eighth and ninth runners from that team would be "removed" from the results for the purposes of qualifying individuals for state.

Forget about back-door team qualifiers in 4A and 5A. It ain't happening.

5A

Nothing much has changed about 5A lately. There are five regions and five teams qualify from each region.

Individual qualifying in 5A is exactly the same as in 4A