News-Record.com

The Greensboro Sports Commission brought us Monte Towe at today's Little Four luncheon and, speaking about a hundred yards from where N.C. State took down UCLA like Nixon in '74, the Wolfpack assistant coach was still visibly excited about the whole experience.

Towe's talk preceded the official unveiling of pairings for the 32nd Little Four Invitational, which will return to the coliseum Special Events Center from Dec. 26-28, about the time Disney on Ice is bringing its interpretation of "Finding Nemo" to the main arena. Something for the both the kids and basketball fans for the holidays, apparently ...

Anyway, here are the first-round pairings (with seeds to the left):

First-round matchups Girls No. 4 Page vs. No. 5 Southwest Guilford, 2:30 No. 3 Northwest Guilford vs. No. 6 Northeast Guilford, 4 No. 2 Dudley vs. No. 7 Smith, 6 No. 1 Grimsley vs. No. 8 Greensboro Day, 8 Boys No. 4 Northeast Guilford vs. No. 5 Page, 3:30 No. 3 Grimsley vs. No. 6 Smith, 5 No. 1 Greensboro Day vs. No. 8 Northwest Guilford, 7 No. 2 Dudley vs. No. 7 Southwest Guilford, 8:30

First comment: Kudos to Andy Durham for pointing out over at greensborosports.com that we now have two former ACC star players coaching in the Little Four: Ex-Tar Heel Curtis Hunter at Northeast Guilford and Duke alum Gene Banks now at Smith. Too bad they weren't paired against each other in the first round so we get the guaranteed rivalry matchup.

Before I criticize the seedings, I should mention in the full interest of disclosure that I was asked and did submit my own seedings to the tournament committee.

Really, you can't go wrong with Grimsley as the No. 1 girls team. The Whirlies have four players signing D-I scholarships this week and were last year's 4-A runners-up. Little surprised Page didn't end up seeded higher after winning last year's Little Four and with Boston College commit Jasmine Gill back.

But I think the real criticism in these things comes down to: We're all seeding a tournament based more on programs' reputations than what they really have back talent-wise. There should be a little more info-sharing before seedings are done to eliminate the guessing-game nature of the process, which might be unfair to an Northwest Guilford boys team that probably deserves better than a first-round matchup against Greensboro Day.

Northwest boys coach Mike Everett suggested today that this might be true in the case of the Vikings -- OK, really, he couched it a bit more strongly. But, he makes a good point: Northwest seems to almost be an automatic 8-seed in this tournament each year no matter what. By the coach's estimate, Northwest has won 7 of 8 against Grimsley since he's been at the school. The Whirlies are seeded third. They do have four starters back this year, for what it's worth (and I can't confirm Everett's math off the top of my head).

Greensboro Day beat out Dudley in the boys' final last year, and with Bruce Woodall and Jay Lewis leading the way, it's hard to argue the Bengals as top seeds even if, as coach Freddy Johnson points out, it's a pretty wide-open field.

Shameless plug: Look for our basketball season preview in the News & Record the day after Thanksgiving, Nov. 23. Now back to football ...