Proposal B : Enrollment-Based Playoff Format Could Have Splintering Effect on the Six Basketball Teams From the Pacific Coast League

Proposal B, the Southern Section proposition that would group schools in basketball playoff pairings based on enrollment, has been called the most radical of the two playoff proposals under consideration by Southern Section league representatives.

And, for the Pacific Coast League, which plays in the 2-A division, Proposal B would certainly have the most extreme results.

The six schools that compete against each other during the Pacific Coast League season would splinter into four divisions for playoff consideration.

Laguna Beach High School--one of the smallest schools in Orange County with an enrollment that will be about 700 next year, according to principal David Wheeler--would remain in the 2-A division, along with many small private schools such as Orange Lutheran.

In contrast, Orange High School--which Athletic Director Dave Zirkle says will have an enrollment of 2,100 next school year--would move into the 5-A division, along with such traditionally strong basketball programs as Ocean View, Capistrano Valley and Edison.

Woodbridge, the strongest basketball program in the league, and Costa Mesa, a perennially weak program, would move into the 4-A division. Laguna Hills and Trabuco Hills would compete in the 3-A.

Not surprisingly, such diverse playoff classifications are causing differing reactions at Pacific Coast League schools.

Zirkle, at Orange, favors Proposal A, which would keep the Pacific Coast League in the 2-A. He said early indications are that the league will vote for Proposal A.

He believes that Proposal B, if passed, would thwart Orange’s hopes of rebuilding its basketball program. The Orange boys’ team finished last in league play last season with a 1-9 record. The Panthers were 4-18 overall.

“We’re not happy with Proposal B,” Zirkle said. “It would kill us. If we made it to the playoffs, there would be no way we would get out of the first round, going against the Edisons and Mater Deis.”

Laguna Beach, however, strongly favors Proposal B, which would give it the opportunity to play against schools of its size.

“It’s very difficult to compete with a school of 1,400 or 1,500,” Wheeler said. “From the morale factor, it’s a real positive knowing that you’re going to go against schools your same size at the end of the year.”

Laguna Beach, which finished third in league play last season, lost in a wild-card game, 52-36, to Azusa, a school that lists its enrollment as 1,300 and would play in the 3-A division under Proposal B.

“It was a team that had a bench full of 12 or 14 kids,” Wheeler said. “But with a population like ours, of 700, if you lose one or two athletes, it makes a real impact on the team.”

Some Pacific Coast League coaches, including Rainer Wulf of Trabuco Hills, think Proposal B will force a realignment of leagues along the same enrollment lines. But Wheeler doesn’t think that sending teams from the same league into different playoff divisions will diminish the importance of league play.

“There are a lot of good rivalries going on in our league right now,” Wheeler said. “We compete intensely with each other right now. The problem (with competition) is when we get to the playoffs.”

One team that hasn’t had problems when it gets to the playoffs is the Woodbridge boys’ basketball team, which won the 2-A division in 1986-87 and made it to the final game last season before losing to Banning.

No league opponents think Woodbridge will suffer, at least not initially, under either proposal. Woodbridge, currently with an enrollment of 1,584, may grow under the Irvine school district’s new open enrollment policy. The Warriors’ recent basketball success may attract top athletes who might otherwise select one of the other Irvine schools--Irvine or University.

William Brand, principal of Trabuco Hills and the Southern Section’s playoff groupings chairman, thinks Proposal B will give Pacific Coast League schools--other than Woodbridge--greater opportunity during playoff time.

“Unfortunately or fortunately, depending on how you look at it, no school except Woodbridge has put a team beyond the second round of the (basketball) playoffs,” Brand said. “Now one league could take four or five teams to the playoffs. I think that’s exciting.”