High school playoff schedulers have tough time

Tuesday, November 21st 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) _ There are 12 high school football semifinal playoff games this week, and all but two of them will be played Saturday _ the same day as the Oklahoma-Oklahoma State football game.

The schedule isn't perfect, but those are the breaks. The Oklahoma Secondary School Activities Association routinely schedules semifinal games on Saturdays and likely will continue the practice. Meanwhile, there is no guarantee the OU-OSU game will always be on a Saturday.

``They may play on a Friday next year, who knows? They could play on any of the three days of the Thanksgiving weekend,'' said Danny Rennels, OSSAA executive secretary.

The semifinal games in classes 6A, 4A, 3A, B and C will be played Saturday at sites across the state. Only the 5A semifinals will be played Friday.

A bigger headache than the timing of the semifinals is finding suitable fields to serve as hosts. The OSSAA sent surveys to all the schools that could be feasible locations; some returned them, others didn't.

``Obviously, Thanksgiving weekend is very difficult for schools to get workers. They want to have that time off and be with their families,'' Rennels said. ``We do run into a problem of people not making themselves available.

``And this year has been more difficult than in past years due to the severe weather conditions. Some of the fields weren't playable. We had the drought, then absolute mud bowls for about three weeks in a row. Some of the fields we normally would use are just not playable.''

Using their list of available neutral-site fields, OSSAA officials put together the playoff schedule Sunday. Rennels said they try to be as fair and balanced as possible while structuring the process based on guidelines recommended by the Oklahoma Coaches Association.

Both 6A semifinals are at the University of Oklahoma. Mindful that Tulsa Union will have to travel a long distance to play Moore, the OSSAA put that game at night to give the Redskins plenty of recovery time.

``I thought it was a very fair pairing,'' Rennels said of the overall semifinal picture. ``I really didn't see any issues. I think the biggest distance difference was Poteau coming in to Choctaw (in Class 4A) to play Clinton. That was 175 miles for Poteau and Clinton was about 100.''

So Clinton gets a bit of a break. But last year, Rennels reminded, Clinton had to travel to Tulsa for its semifinal game. ``We were trying, if at all possible, to save some miles for those fans,'' he said.

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There were several outstanding performances during the second round of the playoffs:

_ Paul Smith of Deer Creek completed 10 of 18 passes for 156 yards and three touchdowns as the Antlers beat Tuttle 21-10.

_ Cory Smith of Ringling ran for 173 yards and two scores, including the game-winner with four minutes left in a 21-14 victory over Ringling.

_ Freshman Beau Shiver was 13 of 18 for 185 yards and two TDs as Morrison beat Yale 26-13.

_ Ada's Rock Rodebush ran for 136 yards and two touchdowns in a 35-7 victory over Shawnee.

_ Santee Jackson carried 36 times for 194 yards and two TDs in Carl Albert's 25-13 victory over Douglass.

_ Eufaula beat Perry 20-17 behind Avery Shine's 241 all-purpose yards and two touchdowns. Shine also deflected a pass in the end zone to stop Perry's final drive.

_ Dalton Smith caught two touchdown passes and returned an interception for a score as Pawhuska beat Cascia Hall, 26-17.

_ Moore's defense held Lawton Eisenhower to a season-low 183 yards in a 31-7 victory.

_ Bradley Randle scored five touchdowns as Clinton beat Glenpool 68-7.

_ Justin Willett ran for 148 yards and four TDs in Heritage Hall's 56-22 victory over Marietta.