An extra four teams will qualify for the Greater Middlesex Conference Tournament in baseball this year, under a pilot program approved back in April by the league’s executive committee.
While it wasn’t the main intent, GMC President and East Brunswick Magnet Athletic Director Mike Pede says it’s expected to make both the “main” GMC Championship Tournament and the Invitational more competitive, particularly early on.
In past years, the entire league was seeded from top to bottom, with the top 16 going in the main GMC Tournament, and the rest going into the Invitational. This year, the Championship tournament will include the top 16 games. There will be four first round games, featuring the 20-seed playing at the 13-seed, 19 at 14, then 18 at 15, and the 17-seed at the 16-seed.
The second round would then be the round of 16, followed by the quarterfinals, semifinals and finals.
Scroll to the bottom of this story for the full tournament schedule.
Pede says the change was driven by the league’s coaches.
“In baseball,” Pede explained, “when you go from seeds 14 and 15 to 20, there’s a miniscule difference between those six, seven teams. So, the coaches felt that we really should go to 20 to get a true feel of the GMC Conference champion.”
Pede says pitching also factored into the adoption of the pilot.
“You really had no advantage being the one-seed,” explained Pede. “You would have had to have played Monday, Wednesday, Saturday, Saturday. So you would have played three games in the course of six days.”
“At least now, the one through 12-seeds are getting a bye, where they don’t have to play Saturday, so they go right to Monday.”
I also allows for more evenly-matched games early in the tournament, where the No. 16 team isn’t playing the top seed right off the bat.
“Now, in the Invitational Tournament, you have seeds through 21 through 33, which is a more competitively balanced tournament, as is one through 20 in the GMC Championship.”
Pede believes the GMC, overall, has done a good job of adapting – in all its sports – to the changing landscape of high school sports in the league, all in the name of competitive balance, and in the best interest of the student-athletes.
“I say this all the time, and I know I’m probably biased, but I think we at the GMC do things better than anybody else because we’re progressive,” Pede tells Central Jersey Sports Radio. “We don’t just think ‘We’ve done it this way for 50 years and we’re going to keep doing it this way.’ No.”
“We understand that times have changed and you may have to make changes with it. The way we do divisions is a great example of that.”
Here’s the schedule for the GMC Championship Tournament:
- First Round: Saturday, May 6, teams 13 through 20 play at higher seeds, times TBA
- Second Round: Monday, May 8, round of 16 at higher seeds, times TBA
- Quarterfinals: Wednesday, May 10 at North Brunswick Community Park, 4 and 7 pm
- Semifinals: Saturday, May 13 at East Brunswick Magnet School, 12 and 2:30 pm
- Finals: Saturday, May 20 at East Brunswick Magnet School, 2 pm
Both the Championship and Invitational Tournaments will be seeded at 9 am Friday at East Brunswick Magnet School, and Central Jersey Sports Radio will have live coverage on Twitter (@cjsportsradio) and a full story immediately following the seeding meeting on cjsportsradio.com.
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