Memorial Fieldhouse will be a busy place the next two nights.
That's because it will be the scene of sports events involving the state's biggest high school rivals, Parkersburg High and Parkersburg South.
It starts tonight when the boys basketball teams meet for the second and final time during the regular season.
The Big Reds and Patriots first met on Dec. 23 at the Rod Oldham Athletic Center, where PHS overcame a three-point halftime deficit and rolled to a 78-63 win, Parkersburg's fourth straight win in the series after South had won 16 of the previous 18 meetings.
The Big Reds are off to a solid 6-3 start while South is 2-5, including four losses in its last five games.
Come Wednesday night, it will be time for the annual dual wrestling match between the state's two most successful Class AAA programs.
South, the three-time defending state champions, has won 104 consecutive dual matches, so obviously the Patriots will be the favorite.
But Parkersburg High has made great strides this season and the Big Reds would love nothing more than to be the one to stop South's streak.
Knowledgeable fans of the two teams sit around all day with the proposed starting lineups and try to figure out what the final score is going to be.
But once the match starts, upsets begin happening, one team gathers some momentum, and all the predictions go out the window.
I tell my fellow sports writers they need to come to Parkersburg one time and attend this annual tradition. There simply is nothing else like it in West Virginia. It's the loudest, most intense event you ever will attend.
It's often been said if South met PHS in tiddlywinks, it would draw a crowd.
You can bet the Patriots and Big Reds will draw good crowds the next two nights.
While there is virtually zero support for a full-fledged playoff as occurs with the smaller college divisions, anything will be an improvement over the current system which relies on computer ratings and human polls to determine who plays for the national title.
That makes college football the only sport where the champion isn't settled on the field.
The most likely outcome?
Administrators will insist on protecting the 12-game regular season (a must for revenue purposes) and the plethora of bowl games (which enhance the economy of the sponsoring cities). But they may be willing to look at a four-team playoff or to add one more game after all the bowl games have been played.
Many have waited a long time for this to happen and it looks like it just might.
