Devils Lake won an appeal to the NDHSAA on Tuesday to keep both of its basketball teams in Class A.
Devils Lake, on behalf of its boys’ and girls’ teams, presented to the NDHSAA Classification Committee alongside the Valley City girls, Kindred boys, Westhope/Newburg boys and Bishop Ryan boys. Each of those squads won its appeal to stay in its respective class.
All of those teams have one thing in common: They accumulated six or more tournament performance factor points over the first two years of the three-class basketball system, which was adopted in North Dakota last season. The original procedure outlined by the NDHSAA declared that a team with at least six points over a three-year period would be promoted to the next-highest division, with schools having an opportunity to appeal.
The maximum points that a team can earn in one year is four. The Devils Lake boys and girls each reached that mark last year with a state title. Teams are awarded three points for being a state runner-up, so the Firebirds boys totaled seven points over the last two years. The girls reached a state semifinal this season, which gave them two extra points and six overall.
A news release on NewsDakota.com wrote that Devils Lake was represented by multiple officials, including athletic director Jason Wiberg. Per the article, they argued that Devils Lake was an “oddball” in terms of enrollment, given that the town is larger than a typical Class B town but significantly smaller than Fargo, Grand Forks, etc. The Firebirds’ struggles against the larger schools was a reason why the three-class system was beneficial for them in the first place; before last season, the Devils Lake boys had gone 99 years without a state championship.
NewsDakota.com also noted that Wiberg brought up the boys’ and girls’ “unusually strong senior classes,” which will peter out in the coming seasons.
The Devils Lake boys are certainly losing a powerful chunk of players to graduation this year. Four of their five starters were seniors (Parker Brodina, Joel Nelson, Oliver Wirth, Trason Beck), including three of their four all-region players (Brodina, Nelson, Wirth). They also had the Class A Senior Athlete of the Year in Brodina. They’ll be losing eight seniors total.
“We’ve got eight seniors; we’re gonna drop off,” Devils Lake boys head coach Dustin Brodina said on Hot Mic with Dom Izzo on March 21. “We’re not gonna reload like some of the bigger schools. We can’t. We just don’t have those resources. And so we’ll ebb and flow; I know we will.”
The girls are also losing some key seniors. Cabryn Fritel, Torri Fee and Claire Heilman were all starters for most of the season, with Jolie Martison, Anna Shock and Kendra Eckes all playing important roles off the bench.
Both teams’ current junior classes are comparatively small in numbers.
Another point consistently brought up by coaches, players, family, etc. is the travel aspect. Devils Lake gets to play relatively closer teams like Four Winds/Minnewaukan, Thompson and Carrington instead of taking numerous late-night trips to Fargo and back. Devils Lake was always somewhat of an outlier in the EDC — and still is in other sports — with being smaller and farther away.
Through two years of the three-class system thus far, there have been no repeat champions at any level, for either boys or girls. The only championship matchup that’s been the exact same both years is in the Class A boys’ division, with Devils Lake vs. Kindred.
Many people have taken to social media to argue, in particular, Bishop Ryan’s inclusion in Class B. Bishop Ryan is a private Catholic school in Minot, which many feel isn’t true to the spirit of small-town, rural Class B competition. The Bishop Ryan boys won a state championship this year, although it was their first since 1994. They lost in the semifinals last year to North Star.
So, the arrangement will remain the same for these teams, at least for another year. NewsDakota.com added that the committee had a “lengthy discussion” about the reclassification system and how heavily enrollment should weigh in. The article indicated that they’re still very open to modifying the system.
