I bitched last year (I can't find the entry, but I know I did) about how bad the new Illinois basketball playoff scheme is. Fortunately, North got picked as a regional site this year, so they will get their first two games at home. Glenbrook South gets a little screwed... being the #2 seed, they can't play at the same site as another top-4, so I'm guessing they'll get sent to Maine East instead.
This will be a tough playoff run... their own sectional doesn't look shabby, and they feed into the Loyola University supersectional with the Lake Zurich sectional, which includes Warren, Zion-Benton, Highland Park, and Stevenson. It's doable, but nobody rides for free, you know? You've got to win five games to get downstate, and not more than two of them will be easy.
I'm looking ridiculously into the future, but the way I think the state final brackets are drawn, there exists the possibility of in-/cross-conference matchups in the title game again. New Trier and Evanston are both in the Niles West sectional, feeding through the United Center 1 super, landing in the opposite half of the downstate bracket.
Bloody hell... the IHSA changed their "just the scores" results page to use a table. I'm gonna have to rewrite my script for sending scores to my cell phone...
