Mesa District athletic director Dr. Steve Hogen’s proposal to use a shot clock in a regular season tournament must first be approved by the Arizona Interscholastic Association’s rules review committee before the experiment can move forward.

The proposal was introduced during Monday’s April AIA Executive Board meeting. The lack of a shot clock in basketball has been a hot topic in media circles and with coaches, and we should know by at least Friday morning if the shot clock proposal will expire or continue to run.

The AIA will meet with the rules review committee on Thursday to examine the topic and possibly give the go-ahead to allow Dr. Hogen’s tournament, the VisitMesa.com Basketball Challenge, as well as other tournaments next season to use a shot clock.

“I’m anticipating that the rules review committee will want more tournaments to use (a shot clock) before approving it (as an experiement),” said Chuck Schmidt, the AIA’s associate executive director.  “If it is approved, we will gather the data and present it to the NFHSA (National Federation of High School Associations).”

It also sounds like the AIA might be in favor of the proposal.

“I think it (shot clock) is the right thing to do personally,” Schmidt said. “I think we need to start looking at it as an option. I think the public wants to see a shot clock.”

Annual audit results

The results from the AIA’s annual audit were revealed Monday, and one of the big numbers that stood out was $519,000.

That’s the fiscal loss the AIA suffered during the past fiscal year. The cost increase for renting tournament venues and managing officials and about 6,5000 employees significantly increased the costs for the AIA in the past year.

The AIA is the only high school state association in the nation that assigns officials, but Schmidt said it’s an important service. It’s also a service that has been lauded nationally.

Despite the high fiscal loss, the AIA has made strides to improve its financial footing since 2006.

“We are in sound financial shape,” Schmidt said. “We prepared for these issues. This has been the ongoing process since 2006, (since) changing over how the association ran and since when the new 990 (tax exempt form) came into play in 2008 (along with) the required audit standards and general accepted accounting practices. We are following all of those. It has given us an accurate picture. And I would say we are now as consistent as we can be (in) seeing what the issues are.” 

New board members chosen

On Monday, the executive board also elected two board members to serve three-year terms.

For the 5A Conference, Tucson District’s Herman House, Desert Vista’s Anna Battle and Hogen were nominated. After the first round of voting, Battle and House were chosen to advance to the next round of voting, which finished in a tie after a secret ballot.

AIA board president Dan Serrano broke the tie by voting for Battle, who’ll serve on the board as the 5A rep from 2014-17. The other available seat was the 2A’s, which current 2A rep Wallace Youvella occupies and will continue to do so after Monday’s vote.

The AIA’s executive board president and vice president only serve one-year terms. The board picked Marana Unified School District Superintendent Doug Wilson, the current board vice president, as its next board president and Safford District board member Mike DeLaO as the next vice president. 

AIA board member Sister Lynn Winsor of Xavier Prep also was chosen to continue to be the board’s Arizona Interscholastic Athletic Administrators Association’s rep.

More AIA board notes

The request by more than 20 basketball coaches to participate in the Arizona Basketball Coaches Association Annual Senior and Underclassmen All-Star games on May 17 at Mesa Community College was denied.

The Shadow Mountain-Washington request to move its scheduled 2014 football game to zero week because of eligibility and low player turnout concerns was also denied.

Michele Staples of the AIA announced that this year’s recipient of the Class 4-5A Tony Komadina Award for Outstanding Girls Athletic Program will go to Notre Dame High. The award will be presented during the AIA’s annual Award Luncheon on May 19 at University of Phoenix Stadium.