The stage is set.

Both the La Salle and East Providence football teams won their games last weekend, which means their annual Thanksgiving Day game not only will be a holiday classic, but also a showdown for the top seed in the Division I playoffs.

Undefeated La Salle improved its Division I record to 7-0 with a 35-0 victory over Barrington Friday night. The victory assured the Rams of at least a share of the Division I regular-season title.

But the Rams still are not assured of being the top seed for the four-team Division I playoffs. That's because while La Salle was beating Barrington on Friday night, East Providence was improving its record to 6-1 with 28-6 victory over Cranston West.

So if East Providence knocks La Salle from the undefeated ranks on Thanksgiving, the Townies not only will share the regular-season title, but also will be the top seed for the playoffs.

Regardless of whether it wins or loses on Thanksgiving, La Salle will be one of the top two seeds for the tournament and will host a semifinal round game on Tuesday, Nov. 28.

East Providence, on the other hand, needs a victory on Thanksgiving to host a semifinal game. The Townies' only Division I loss this season was a 30-22 setback to Hendricken in the first week of the season. If East Providence loses on Thanksgiving, it will drop into a second-place tie with Hendricken (6-2), and the Hawks will gain home-field advantage for the opening round of the playoffs.

So La Salle and East Providence will meet for the 77th time on Thanksgiving morning at Pierce Field, with more than just holiday bragging rights on the line. If you don't like standing in line, it probably would be a good idea to get your tickets early.

Don't rub it in

North Kingstown earned the fourth and final Division I playoff berth with a victory over Portsmouth last Friday night, but the Skippers didn't exactly strike a blow for good sportsmanship en route to the triumph.

Apparently some people, especially the Portsmouth coaching staff, were not happy that North Kingstown opted to give senior running back Chancelor Logan a chance to score his fourth touchdown when the Skippers had a 33-21 lead and a first down with less than a minute to play.

Rather than having the quarterback take a couple of knees to run out the clock, the North Kingstown coaching staff gave Logan the ball. He raced 33 yards for his fourth touchdown with 44 seconds to play.

It was Logan's 18th carry of the game.

Game of games

The East Providence-La Salle matchup is the only Thanksgiving Day game that will affect the semifinal-round playoff pairings.

The semifinal matchups in the Interscholastic League's other three divisions were all set last weekend.

Central earned the fourth and final berth in Division III with a victory over Smithfield on Saturday, and will now meet top-seeded Moses Brown in the semifinals. Ponaganset and East Greenwich will meet in the other Division III game.

Top-seeded Classical will play North Providence and Exeter-West Greenwich will meet Middletown in the two Division IV games.

Shea, Chariho, Cranston East and South Kingstown earned semifinal berths in Division II with victories in the opening round of the eight-team Division II tournament last weekend. Chariho will host Cranston East and Shea will host South Kingstown.

A big kick out of Horan

I don't know what the official record is for the longest field goal in R.I. schoolboy history, but the 53-yarder by Narragansett's William Horan Saturday against Tiverton has to be one of the all-time longest boots.

Head of the class

Steve Squatrito , a football and baseball first-team All-Stater in the mid-80s, heads the list of 15 individuals who have been named to the 2006 induction class for the Bristol Athlete Hall of Fame.

Joining Squatrito in this year's induction class are former three-sport stars Daryl Wilbur (football, hockey, baseball), Miko Tam (football, basketball, baseball), former football and golf star Chris Giarla and basketball and softball standout Michelle Alves. Others selected are Steve DeCastro and Mark Camelo (soccer), Jim Berry, Alvaro Ximinex and Mark Hartshorn (swimming); Chris Brown, John Furtado, Kevin Ascoli and Matt Mosher (wrestling) and John Castriotta (football).

Good call

Usually it's a no-win proposition when you're trying to outguess New England weather, but Interscholastic League officials definitely made the right call last Friday when they moved the three girls state title soccer games, originally scheduled for Sunday, up to Saturday because of the forecast for heavy rain.

The switch made it tough for those of us in the media trying to cover six state titles games (3 boys and 3 girls) on the same day, but playing on Saturday turned out to be a much better situation for the players and fans than it would have been playing in the rain on Sunday.

jgillool@projo.com / (401) 277-7340