Whew, I'm tired

The busiest time of year for small sports departments in Wisconsin is the last week of the prep football season.

We were helped out somewhat in the fact that our Week 9 games were split up, but rather than stay in the office, we decided to get out and cover as much as possible. But there's still the daily paper to put out in addition to WIAA soccer regionals. It's made for a busy few days.

So, I'm going to try to make up for my lack of posts in the last 48 hours with some solid insight here.

For starters, I'm amazed that Springs wasn't included in the WIAA playoff field. But it appears that a handful of teams that finished .500 in their conference were left out. You can read the tiebreakers here (it's on page 4). It's a shame the Ledgers won't make the postseason, because I think they could have done some damage once again. Not sure if they were a state title contender, but I could have seen them advancing to the third round.

Waupun is really, really, really good. They looked a lot like the 2003 Ripon state championship team in the first quarter of Thursday's game with the Tigers. The 49-28 game did turn somewhat exciting when Ripon's Scott Gillespie started winging the ball all over the place. I like Waupun's chances in the playoffs, depending on the matchup. If it draws Wisconsin Lutheran and Kewaskum in the same grouping (which is a possibility), it'll be a tough road. But if they are sent to the West or the North, we could have a state title game on our hands here.

One area team that you should keep an eye on in the playoffs is Mayville. Although quarterback Matt Haass is banged up a little bit, the Cardinals have really developed the running game this year. And if teams think that Haass is too injured to make a difference, they will be taking a big risk by playing more against the run than the pass. Depending on matchups, I like Mayville to advance pretty deep in Division 4.