The Pea Ridge Blackhawk softball and baseball teams have both qualified for the state 4A tournament set to begin Thursday, May 11, in Lonoke. They are among the four qualifiers from the 4A North Regional Tournament held in Dover.
The 'Hawks are among 12 finalist schools from the three regionals just completed on Monday. The Lady 'Hawks had their best regional ever, taking second in the competition, going into state play with a sparkling 27-4 record. The 'Hawks blasted Ozark 8-2 in the first round of competition, buried Lincoln 9-2 in the semi-finals before losing a tough 3-1 battle to cross-county rival Gravette 3-1 Monday afternoon.
The boys finished fourth in the just concluded tournament to move on to the finals. The Blackhawks disposed of Dardanelle 8-4 in the first round before a disastrous first few innings tripped them up in the loss to Booneville in the semifinals. Booneville got ahead 10-2 in the first half of the game but Pea Ridge rallied to within 4 but could not make up the deficit, losing 11-7. The 'Hawks had beaten Booneville 1-0 earlier in the season. In the third place playoff game, the 'Hawks lost a slug fest with Pottsville 13-11. The Apaches had grabbed a 13-5 lead in the top half of the the inning to seemingly ice the game. Pea Ridge came back with six runs in the bottom of the fifth to get back into but could not dent the plate in the final two innings.
The girls play Thursday against Mena in a first round game at 3 p.m. Should they win, they will take on the winner of the Heber Springs/Stuttgart East Region game.
The boys take on the top-ranked team left in the tournament in Jonesboro Westside in their first rounder. The Warriors were whipped 14-3 by Central Arkansas in the East Region final. The three region winners (and the South Region runner up) have to play two games at the most in the tournament this week before moving on to the state final in Fayetteville next week. The other eight teams have to win three straight contests to make the big show on Razorback soil.
The 12 boys teams at the state baseball tourney and their state rankings include: Pea Ridge (eighth), Pottsville (sixth), Booneville (seventh), Shiloh (third), Central Arkansas (fifth), Westside (second), Heber Springs (ninth), Lonoke (10th), Nashville (fourth), Malvern (13th), Monticello (11th) and Arkadelphia (24th). Ashdown, the top-ranked boys team in the state did not make the field after being upset 4-3 by Arkadelphia in the region's first round.
The dozen girls team in the mix include Pea Ridge (fourth), Gravette (third), Lincoln (21st), Pottsville (second), Heber Springs (eighth), Stuttgart (12th) ,Trumann (ninth) , Harrisburg (15th), Bauxite (first), Nashville (sixth), Crossett (10th) and Mena (27th).
Big changes ahead in the 4A-1
Luckily for the Pea Ridge faithful, it takes so long for the Arkansas Activities Association to count and figure school enrollments, that the 'Hawks have three more years to be at home in the 4A-1.
The latest count of Arkansas high school enrollments have the Blackhawks ranked as the sixth biggest school in the 4A class with an official enrollment of 456. By contrast, the smallest 5A school in the state are the Blytheville Chickasaws with 506 enrolled students, only 50 more students than Pea Ridge.
Pea Ridge has steadily grown over the past few years, ranking among the bottom of enrolled 4A schools after being moved up from the 3A, and now on the verge of being a 5A size school. The fact is, Pea Ridge may well have enough to be among 5A schools next year but the way the AAA handles it, it won't matter until the fall of 2021. With the growth rate here at Pea Ridge, that is almost a foregone conclusion.
Before folks begin to panic at the thought of driving all over the place for 5A competition (the nearest 5A teams right now are Harrison, Farmington and Alma), there are several other 4A-1 teams that may also join the 5A in 2021, making it more of a local conference anyway. Huntsville will be making the move up after this next school year as they have an enrollment of 519, third to the bottom of the 5A ranks.
While Pea Ridge is sixth in the state in 4A size, they are still smaller than Berryville, third with 486, Prairie Grove fourth with 469, and Gravette fifth with 464. These four teams could conceivably combine with former 4A members Huntsville and Farmington and join Harrison and Alma into a new 5A West. But that's for later.
In the next cycle in the fall of 2018, Green Forest and Elkins will be new 4A members. I would guess that Green Forest would join the 4A-1 with Elkins going to the 4A-4. That would be because the 4A-4 is losing Booneville and West Fork to the 3A class. There is no 4A league even near Green Forest to the east so they will almost certainly move into our league. Elkins would be the northern member of the 4A-4, taking the place of departing West Fork.
Interestingly, Baptist Prep, the two-time 4A basketball champion, will be moving to 3A after this next school year. Other interesting changes is that Texarkana is going to 5A next round with Haas Hall of Fayetteville dropping into 2A. Texarkana used to be among the biggest schools in Arkansas but not anymore. In the old days, the largest school category was almost all Little Rock schools. Only one, Little Rock Central, still has membership in the 7A. If Fayetteville ever splits or if Springdale splits again, that would place half the big schools in the state in our bi-county area.
Within the 4A-1, there has become a big divide of sorts with enrollment. The top four average about 465 per school with the bottom three in enrollment (Lincoln, Gentry and Green Forest) average roughly 315 per school.
Major league baseball in full swing
I was bemoaning the early going of the major league season with my St. Louis Cardinals having the worst record of any team in all of major league baseball with a 2-9 record out of the gate.
A couple of weeks later, the Cards sweep the Braves in a enjoyable series in Atlanta and what do you know, the Cards left the field tied for the Central Division lead of the National League with a 16-14 record. Of course, with 152 more games on the schedule, it is too early to predict a trend. But I will predict one anyway. The Cards will win it all in '17.
State 4A Top 20 Baseball teams
1^Ashdown^24-5
2^Westside^19-3
3^Shiloh Christian^22-6
4^Nashville^25-7
5^Central Arkansas^20-7
6^Pottsville^24-6
7^Booneville^24-7
8^Pea Ridge^21-6
9^Heber Springs^21-6
10^Lonoke^18-11
11^Monticello^22-6
12^Hamburg^21-6
13^Malvern^17-11
14^Prairie Grove^15-7
15^Robinson^17-9
16^Gosnell^15-7
17^Huntsville^24-7
18^Dover^16-11
19^Brookland^15-10
20^Ozark^17-7
State 4A Top 20 Softball
1^Bauxite^32-1
2^Pottsville^28-4
3^Gravette^23-7
4^Pea Ridge^27-3
5^Monticello^23-4
6^Nashville^20-6
7^Malvern^18-8
8^Heber Springs^23-10
9^Trumann^19-10
10^Crossett^22-10
11^Brookland^15-9
12^Stuttgart^24-8
13^Dardanelle^18-12
14^Prairie Grove^18-10
15^Harrisburg^17-8
16^Ozark^16-10
17^Booneville^15-10
18^Star City^19-11
19^Pocahontas^14-7
20^DeWitt^17-9
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Editor's note: John McGee is an award-winning columnist and sports writer. He is the art teacher at Pea Ridge elementary schools and writes a regular sports column for The Times. The opinions expressed are those of the author. He can be contacted through The Times at [email protected].
Sports on 05/10/2017