The 3A-5A baseball district brackets were released Wednesday, and three area teams will be hosting playoff action this weekend – Pine Creek, Cañon City and St. Mary’s. This was the first year an RPI system was used to seed the 32 teams in each classification.

Pine Creek (17-2) – the outright 5A Colorado Springs Metro League champions for the sixth year in a row – earned the top seed in the 5A bracket, and will host No. 32 Rangeview.

“I never love being No. 1 because everyone is looking at you, but these kids are level-headed and they know they have to play well,” Pine Creek coach Glenn Millhauser said. “In baseball, anything can happen, and at this point the teams are all pretty good. But we’re playing our best baseball of the season, so I like our chances.”

In the 4A bracket, the two area conference champions were seeded on opposite ends of the spectrum, but could play for a district title.

Cañon City (17-2), the 4A CSML champions, were given the final host seed at No. 8, while Air Academy (14-5), the winner of the 4A Pikes Peak Athletic Conference, is seeded No. 24.

Cañon City’s seed was a shocker, as it’s ranked 14th in the RPI and has the seventh-weakest schedule in 4A, yet still will host No. 25 Centaurus – which got into the field at 6-13. Woodland Park (12-7) and Mesa Ridge (11-8) were left out.

The Tigers will host due to 4A’s selection process differing from 5A and 3A. In 4A, the 10 league champions are ranked 1-10 and the top eight RPI rankings are the hosts. Cañon City’s RPI was higher than Air Academy’s and all of the teams from the Southwestern league.

“We’re really happy; it’s the first time since 2010 we get to host, and it’s always nice to be at home,” Cañon City athletic director Scott Manchester said. “It becomes a matter of still having to win, and some things are out of our control, like strength of schedule. Centaurus is on the flip side of us because they don’t have many wins in a strong league. We’re not overlooking them at all.”

The Kadets will look to upset No. 9 Silver Creek and set up a potential all-area district title game with Cañon City. The Tigers defeated Air Academy on its home field in a 2013 district title game.

“I don’t think we feel disrespected, we all just collectively smiled at each other and said maybe we’ll be a really good No. 24 seed,” Air Academy coach Doug Goldberg said. “The kids are competitors and are disappointed, but it doesn’t matter what seed we are. We’re excited to be in the tournament.”

St. Mary’s (14-5) earned the No. 3 seed in the 3A bracket thanks to a solid résumé and the third-toughest schedule in the state. The Pirates will host No. 30 Platte Valley, with a familiar face – No. 14 CSCS (12-6) – possibly waiting in the district title game.

The Pirates defeated the Lions 12-10 in the 3A Tri-Peaks Crossover third-place game last week.

The team that won that crossover, Manitou Springs (11-8), enters the bracket as the 11 seed and will travel to La Junta to face No. 22 Coal Ridge. The Mustangs hit the road, despite beating St. Mary’s twice in the last week and defeating No. 6 La Junta for the Tri-Peaks title. Manitou Springs had the second-toughest schedule in the state.

“I don’t mind going on the road,” Manitou Springs coach Cory Archuleta said. “We didn’t take care of business in the regular season to deserve a top-eight seed. La Junta is one of the top teams in the state, and we only played them once, so there isn’t a lot of familiarity there. But we have our work cut out for us with Coal Ridge.”