Looking back at the surprises of Christmas

It's hard to imagine anybody outside of Bell City predicting a Christmas tournament championship for the Cubs, but their performance at the Show Me Center this week was amazing. The Cubs came into the tournament at 4-4, then picked off three higher seeds - Scott County Central, Charleston and Jackson - for their first-ever title in the tournament. I've asked around, and nobody can remember the last time a team entered the tournament at .500 and left with a championship.

Besides being a huge boost for Bell City, the Cubs' win is a selling point for the tournament itself. It's the first time since 2000 that a small school has won it all. Bell City also becomes the fifth different winner in the past eight years, joining Notre Dame (2005), Jackson (2003, 2004), Charleston (2001, 2002), Advance (2000) and Scott City (1999) as champs.

The tournament will still catch flak for its format of scheduling eight mostly lopsided games on Day 1, even though it's a format that the majority of schools involved continue to vote for each year. But as long as underdogs walk out with a title the way Bell City did this year and the way Notre Dame did last year, a change in the format isn't likely.

Other tournament thoughts:

On the western edge of Southeast Missouri, Eminence had a surprise finish by reaching the title game of the holiday tournament at Cabool. Pete McBride's team was seeded eighth, then lost in a close championship game to Crocker and left with a 9-4 record. It's shaping up as a Bell City-Eminence final in the Class 1 District 2 tournament.

Besides Eminence, other surprises from the week of tournaments: Puxico was 3-1 and finished third at the Bloomfield tournament; Farmington was 3-1 after losing in the final at Park Hills; Advance was 3-1 and defeated Scott County Central for fifth place at Cape Girardeau; and Richland was seeded 16th and went 3-1 at Bloomfield to win the consolation title.

Teams that have to be disappointed with the week that was: Scott Central went 2-2 in the Cape tournament with losses to Bell City and Advance; South Iron lost twice at Park Hills after entering the tournament unbeaten; Sikeston went 1-2 at Dyersburg and is one game above .500; and eighth-seeded Hayti went 0-2 at Bloomfield.