MIKE BURKE
Allegany Communications Sports
The West Virginia Secondary Schools Athletic Commission, better known as the WVSSAC or, even better, the SSAC, has become a mini-series. And among the so many immortal words of the late great Spencer, West Virginia native, Charles E. Lattimer, “It’s a (goshdarn) mystery.”
Through over 35 years as a sportswriter for the Cumberland Times-News, I would be a millionaire if I had been paid a nickel (uh, wait …) for every time I wrote that the Maryland Public Secondary Schools Athletic Association (MPSSAA) couldn’t hold a candle to the WVSSAC.
I did that for two reasons – 1.) It was true; 2.) Nothing ticked off the boys in Baltimore at MPSSAA CONTROL headquarters more than to be compared to the WVSSAC for one very simple reason – West Virginia was just better. West Virginia did it better, because West Virginia loved doing it.
This is not to say the same is not true, because the MPSSAA remains more “because we have to” now than they’ve ever been, which, in itself, is a statement. Yet the MPSSAA has done nothing to surpass the WVSSAC, or to even distinguish itself for that matter. They remain a joke.
The SSAC seems to have let itself lose control for the sake of analytics and perceived entitlement, and it began when the decision was made to go from three classifications to four, which in itself was the right call if you ask me. Things just … got out of hand.
That said, this isn’t the place to read about the step-by-steps of it all; there have been too many of them. Yet as far back as when it was learned Frankfort was moving from Class AA to Class AAA (which didn’t happen), not because of enrollment, but because the school was located near Cumberland, Maryland?
That’s when we saw a bad moon a-risin’. We saw trouble on the way, not to mention earthquakes and lightnin’, and bad times today.
Which is what we are now seeing because the entire WVSSAC football playoffs and the Class A volleyball playoffs have been postponed indefinitely and are crossbar and net-high in litigation. All because of coddling to the newly created Class AAAA and because of something called enrollment score-location score-economic score, which is based on 80-10-10, 70-20-10, 70-15-15 and 60-20-20.
And for the life of me, even though I’ve read a million words about this (gosh-darn) quagmire (another Lattimerism), I have no idea what the hell is going on here (that’s right, Lattimer), other than Class A volleyball isn’t playing, meaning those players are being cheated out of the state tournament experience while the other three classes play in the state tournament; and four football teams, including Hampshire, who were/weren’t/still might be/still might not be in the playoffs are playing so-called play-in games this weekend that might or might not even matter.
In the immortal words of the late great Hubert H. Humphrey (who was not from Spencer, West Virginia, by the way), “For once in my life I’m speechless, but let me say this,” as a proud native of Maryland who spent nearly 40 years covering high school sports in Maryland and in West Virginia, in my wildest dreams, I never believed I could see such an unnecessary mess such as this one take place in West Virginia.
Furthermore, given all of the stupid things I have seen and covered in high school sports, I never even dreamed something like this could happen in Maryland.
And that’s not a measuring stick you want to stand next to.
Mike Burke writes about sports and other stuff for Allegany Communications. He began covering sports for the Prince George’s Sentinel in 1981 and joined the Cumberland Times-News sports staff in 1984, serving as sports editor for over 30 years. Contact him at [email protected]. Follow him on X @MikeBurkeMDT