No more midnight hour at state baseball tourney?

DES MOINES - It wasn't really his players Charlie Stumpff was concerned with. It was himself.

The Iowa City West baseball coach isn't used to being awake when midnight approaches. That's about the time all three of his team's games at the state baseball tournament got finished last week.

"The young kids deal well," Stumpff said. "I'm the one you need to worry about."

The Iowa High School Athletic Association is worried about everyone, which means there's a strong possibility you'll see a change in starting times for next year's state tournament games. There are two daily sessions at Principal Park, with listed game times as noon and 2 p.m., 6 and 8 p.m.

Considering there are 45 minutes between each game to re-prepare the field and let teams take infield and outfield practice, you'd have to have one hour and 15-minute games to keep the schedule on time.

When was the last time you saw an hour and 15-minute prep baseball game?

"The four years I've been here, I think that's happened one time," said IHSAA Assistant Executive Director Todd Tharp, who is in charge of the baseball tournament for the IHSAA. "This is year five here, working with the Iowa Cubs. I think they'd be willing to work with us if we come up with some kind of proposal now after looking at things for five years and looking at the lengths of all our games to see what the next steps are for next year."

The IHSAA moved the entire state tournament to Des Moines in 2005 after splitting it between Marshalltown and Carroll. It's an eight-day affair that actually began July 24 and 25 with two Class 1A quarterfinals each of those nights.

After a day off July 26 (a Sunday), the tournament picked back up last Monday with four games each day. The big problem has been the finales, which have ranged in starting time from 8:30 to 9:45 p.m.

West has really gotten the short end of the stick in that regard with all three of its games (a quarterfinal win over Cedar Rapids Washington, a semifinal win over Johnston and a championship ..... to Sioux City North) being second ones at night. 

"This year, it's been Iowa City West," Tharp said. "For them to have that late game on Wednesday night against Wash that didn't get over until midnight. Then (Saturday) night, it doesn't get over until about 11:45. We appreciate the concerns the Iowa City administration has with kids driving back home a couple of hours (late at night). You've got parents who were probably here at 7:30 waiting for an eight o'clock start, and the game doesn't start until 9:30.

"It is something we probably need to look at now."

Tharp said maybe the key is starting the day session at 11 a.m instead of noon. He said perhaps it's making each day one session instead of two. 

It sounds like something's going to change.

"The two-hour thing, there's just not enough time," said Stumpff, whose team bused back and forth between Iowa City and Des Moines three days. "You have 45 minutes between games. They just need to build it in three-hour windows some way."