If you look at the Maryland Public Secondary Schools Athletic Association's field hockey tournament draw, and you know anything of your state geography, you can only wonder what happened to half the field.

That's because two of the state's largest subdivisions, Baltimore City and Prince George's County, don't play field hockey, which means that the entire first round in the four classifications consists of 11 matches, with some teams drawing byes all the way to the regional semifinals.

There are no first-round games in 1A and only four games out of a possible 16 in the quarterfinals. In some cases, a team would have to win only two matches to get to the state semifinals, and four matches total to win a championship.

It's worth noting that the city and Prince George's are majority African-American subdivisions, and it certainly wouldn't hurt education officials in those respective jurisdictions to go out and drum up support for field hockey programs in those areas, not to mention protecting themselves from possible Title IX troubles.

Sure, they might not challenge Anne Arundel or Montgomery county powers at first or maybe for a while, but winning championships isn't exactly why public schools offer sports, now is it?