The high school basketball season has ended for Wiscasset Middle High School. The boys’ and girls’ teams were both winless in 18 games and once more won’t be seeing any playing time in the tournament games at the Augusta Civic Center over the February break.

Only 12 of the top 18 boys’ class C teams qualify for the tournament, 14 of the top 20 girls’ teams. To have made it, the Wolverine girls would have needed at least six wins during the regular season. The boys needed about eight wins. Both played an 18-game schedule in the Mountain Valley Conference.

Warren Cossette, WMHS assistant principal/athletic director, said the Wolverine boys last made a tournament appearance in 2017. The girls last qualified in 2005. WMHS is certainly not alone in not being able to qualify. Morse High School in Bath and Lincoln Academy in Newcastle won’t be going to the big dance either; although the LA girls just missed qualifying.

Some have argued for opening the tournament to all members of the Maine Principals Association. Why not let every team regardless of their win/loss record have the opportunity to play one game in the post-season on the big stage?

I’m on the fence on this one. But something worth considering is this, even on a winless team there’s always one truly exceptional boy or girl athlete. Having the door to post-season competition shut to them just doesn’t seem quite fair. Consider this: The MVC’s top girls’ scorer and rebounder won’t be going to the playoffs because her team, Telstar High School, didn’t qualify. It won only three games, two of those coming against Wiscasset.

Opening the post-season to everyone will never happen. The high schools with winning records will have dozens of reasons why it won’t work, why it’s not fair to a school with a “successful” basketball program, etc. The MPA will say it would cost too much for officials and to rent the gym and so on.

The fact is, at the high school level, winning goes in cycles. High schools have years when they win, and years when they don’t. Everyone eventually has to take a turn at losing and that’s not such a bad thing because that’s the way it is in life.

Some people will remember in the 1980s and ’90s when Wiscasset High School qualified for the basketball tournament almost every year. In recent years it’s been Boothbay Region High School that’s been winning. Oh, by the way, congratulations to both Seahawk teams and their coaches for another great season this year. We’ll be rooting for you in the tournament.

Well, there’s always next year for the Wolverines, or maybe the year after that. This year’s junior high team had several talented boys and girls playing. They were a lot of fun to watch, well coached, too, and had what I’d call a successful season. This group will continue to get better as they mature and so in a year or two, it will be the Wolverines’ turn to win. Watch and see.