Extra Elite 80 National High School Rankings: How a “Tie” in Softball Can Affect Rankings (It Happened This Week!)

Whether it’s from darkness or weather or shortened games from being in a particular tournament, the dreaded tie has become a factor in the Extra Inning Elite 80 national rankings for high school softball this season.

There should never be any ties in any rankings themselves, and they are rare in high school softball. But when they do happen it’s just hoped that they don’t cause too much of a problem.

On Tuesday as the season opened in Indiana (and elsewhere in the Midwest last weekend), the tie reared its ugly head as preseason No. 2 Roncalli of Indianapolis was involved in a 3-3 tie with Columbus North of Columbus due to darkness.

In the grand scheme of the entire season, if megastar Keagan Rothrock and her teammates go on to win another state title with no further losses or ties and if there are no unbeaten Class 5A or Class 6A state champions from Texas, then the silly little tie with Columbus North will just be a blip on the final record for a mythical national championship season.

Where the tie comes into play is if Lake Creek of Montgomery were to finish unbeaten with another Class 5A state title in Texas or if Lake Ridge of Mansfield were to finish unbeaten with a Class 6A state title in Texas. Historically, teams don’t go unbeaten all the way to the end in either the Texas 5A or 6A state playoffs. Lake Creek did it last year and finished No. 1 in the final Extra Elite 80 with Roncalli at No. 2. If the same thing happens again with both Lake Creek and Roncalli winning out, this time the tie likely would cause Lake Creek to finish No. 1 in all national rankings, not just this one.

Ballard of Louisville, which also was unbeaten in Kentucky last season, has started its season with 10 straight wins. We did not rank the team higher than Roncalli due to the tie because the two are shown in one place of playing each other on May 13 at Roncalli. Other posted schedules don’t show that game taking place.

With all of the cold-weather states now getting underway in the East and Midwest, the Extra Elite 80 will now go weekly until the end of the season in June. Some of the warm weather states, believe it or not, will be in playoff mode in just a couple of weeks.

Everyone playing, some for the first games, also tends to create a lot of teams moving up, dropping out and coming into the rankings.

For this week, there were 13 teams that pushed into the group of the first 50 in the Extra Elite 80 as newcomers. Only a few of those 13 that dropped were even able to hang on with a listing in the next 30 teams placed in this week’s rankings.

— Mark Tennis

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2023 Extra Elite Eighty Rankings

(Previous ranking in parentheses)
(Through reported games of Wednesday, April 5)

1.  (1) Lake Creek (Montgomery, Texas) 28-0

2. (5) Lake Ridge (Mansfield, Texas) 25-0

3.  (2) Roncalli (Indianapolis, Ind.) 1-0-1

4. (4) Ballard (Louisville, Ky.) 10-0

5. (6) Pace (Pace, Fla.) 17-0

6. (8) Los Alamitos (Los Alamitos, Calif.) 13-2

7. (7) St. Amant (St. Amant, La.) 26-1

8. (13) St. Francis (Mountain View, Calif.) 8-1

9. (9) Clovis North (Fresno, Calif.) 15-0-1

10. (10) Anthony Wayne (Whitehouse, Ohio) 2-0

*** Scroll down to see the rest of the 2023 Extra Elite Eighty Preseason teams!

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