NIAA to keep eight-team playoff formats

The Nevada Interscholastic Activities Association's tournament format committee met Wednesday in Reno, and essentially decided on a status quo for future postseason tournaments.

While there had been previous discussion of going from eight-team to six-team postseason tournaments and giving league champions first-round byes, the committee on Wednesday decided to recommend sticking with the eight-team formats for next year's realignment.

Locally, the 24-team Division I will break into two eight-team region tournaments. The 13-team Division I-A will have an eight-team Southern Region tournament.

A final vote on the postseason formats will come at the NIAA board meeting in March.

One change for next season will be the addition of postseason events in tennis and swimming.

Currently, there is only one class in those sports, with the state's Class 2A and 3A teams competing with the Class 4A schools.

But the current Class 4A will be broken up next season, with the teams being realigned into Division I and Division I-A. The local Class 3A teams also will compete in I-A.

That will necessitate an additional postseason tournament at the Division I-A level in swimming and tennis.

The committee still is unsure what to do with boys volleyball and boys and girls bowling, which are only contested in Southern Nevada.

NIAA bylaws state a classification must have at least nine schools to contest a state tournament, but it is unclear whether there will be enough Division I-A schools in boys volleyball and boys and girls bowling to contest a separate tournament.