LEWISTON — Whaddya say, St. Dom’s and Lewiston hockey loyalists? Same time, same place, next year?

Few administrative decisions in high school athletics elicit more hand-wringing, objection and outright bellyaching than Maine Principals’ Association class structure and assignment of schools.

Even Tuesday, as hockey’s Class A final four prepared to lace it up at Androscoggin Bank Colisee, coaches and overseers elsewhere in the state were putting pen to paper or bloviating on behalf of other sports’ future playoffs.

Do basketball and football, for example, require four classification levels, or five? And where is the East-West line of demarcation drawn? Or should we call it North-South?

We see the politicking as it pertains to the puck, too. Hockey’s prevailing system has its detractors. Three classes would be fairer than two, some say. Others suggest a matrix that assigns teams according to recent success and long-term tradition rather than raw enrollment numbers.

Fair criticism. In all sports, of course, a person’s position in these arguments is neatly framed by personal interest. And, full disclosure, I’m a stakeholder as much as anyone else. I’ll stump for whatever result or reorganization sells newspapers and keeps my family fed.

Human nature and disclaimers aside, however, can we all agree that the MPA got it right when they placed Lewiston and St. Dom’s together in the same region in 2009-10?

I remember the day it happened, and not many Devils or Saints were willing to concede that point. The people who wore blue or black were certain the MPA must be seeing white and gold.

You see, for the first time in intergalactic history, it meant no chance of Lewiston and St. Dom’s colliding in a state final. Consider their combined 40-plus combined state titles and it’s easy to understand why that was a stumbling block to so many. Even when Maine high school hockey grew exponentially in the 1990s, necessitating a geographical split, that imaginary line always somehow zigzagged through Lewiston-Auburn and kept the rivals on opposite sides of the tracks.

That all changed six seasons ago. It was an overdue response to the southward migration of the population. Heck, even Waterville, from time immemorial the only school that consistently competed with the L-A programs, was in the midst of transitioning to Class B school, and a small one at that.

The only sensible solution was putting the rivals in the same “pod,” as the playoff bracketologists say. To a region and a sport so strongly associated with tradition, that tinkered with tradition, and it hurt.

Sometimes brutal honesty hurts, also, and the truth, whether we like it or not, is that the world has changed since the 1940s, 1960s and 1980s. Our little hotbed doesn’t enjoy exclusive rights to schoolboy hockey any longer. Falmouth, Biddeford, Thornton, Scarborough, Cheverus and Bangor have evolved into major players. Edward Little has experienced its moments of triumph.

If Lewiston and St. Dom’s were placed on opposite sides of the playoff tree, their odds of meeting in a state final these days would be decidedly remote. Many things would have to go right for both teams. Let’s also not forget that the two schools are drawing largely from the same youth talent pool, even further decreasing their chances of being a consensus No. 1 and No. 2 in the state.

Place them both in the East, on the other hand, and they’re like magnets. Tuesday was the fifth time in six years that Lewiston and St. Dom’s met in the playoffs, and the second in four that they went skate-to-skate in the regional final.

What’s better for high school hockey overall: The off chance of LHS and SDA seeing one another in a state final every third presidential election, or the stone-cold likelihood that the road to one of them playing on the second Saturday of March must pass through the other?

I say there is no debate. The 3,200 paying customers who jammed the venerable rink Tuesday night illustrate my point splendidly.

Already this school year we’ve seen Lewiston-Edward Little and Portland-Deering square off in the boys’ basketball tournament, and Waterville-Winslow do battle in the football and hockey playoffs. I’m sure there are equivalent rivalries to the south and mid-coast in soccer, as well.

No offense to anyone, but not one of those relationships holds a candle to what Lewiston and St. Dom’s represent in hockey. Few comparisons hold up in the entire country, actually.

It’s a game that deserves to happen every year with something enormous at stake. Even if that something enormous is not the ultimate prize, it’s the most pronounced speed bump on the highway to that destination.

The latest St. Dom’s-Lewiston donnybrook is barely in the books, and anyone who cares is already circling dates on the calendar for next year.

Two in the regular season and one in the playoffs.

Kalle Oakes is a staff writer. His email is koakes@sunjournal.com. Follow him on Twitter @Oaksie72.

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