High School class systems in your state

Minnesota: All teams make the playoffs except football, and I'm not sure exactly how they break that down.

Wisconsin: Schools are divided by enrollment, but it changes drastically based on sport. All teams make the playoffs (leading to results like the 121-10 score in a girls regional basketball game this year) except in football, which has seven divisions and is goofy. The field is 224 teams. They must be above .500 IN CONFERENCE or win at least six games as an independent. Then they fill in the rest with teams that were exactly .500 in conference, leading to a bunch of teams getting blasted in Round 1 and finishing 4-6.

 

I'm pretty sure some of the schools here do block scheduling, but most are still 7 classes per day. I think it works fine, and they don't need to change it.

 

Here's how it currently stands in Arkansas, where this fall there will be six football playing classifications:
7A and 6A -- 16 teams each. Two conferences in each class, with top four going to playoffs.
5A -- 32 teams, with four conferences. Top four in each conference goes to playoffs.
4A and 3A -- 48 teams, where there are six conferences of eight teams. Top four in each conference goes to playoffs, where there will be first-round byes for all champions and two second-place finishes, which will rotate.
2A -- 44 teams, where there are six conferences (four with six teams, two with seven). Top four go in each conference, again, where there will be first-round byes.
In basketball, Classes 3A and 2A will have eight conferences with anywhere from six to nine teams, with top four out of conference tournaments going on to regionals and such. Class A will have 14 conferences with anywhere from four to seven teams and four actually going to regionals (crazy, I know). In regional play, two regions will have three teams advance to state on an alternating basis, while the other regions will have two qualify for state.
Of course, this could be all for naught come July 31 and a lawsuit goes in the favor of a Little Rock attorney who is suing over the new multiplier concerning private schools.

 

I know of a state (not mine) where every team makes it, and byes and sites are determined by a blind draw.

So you could have a 10-0 team playing on the road against an 0-10 team, with a 1-9 team getting a bye.

 

Didn't a newspaper do this as an interactive Web graphic a year or so back? I know that obviously some states are changing things, but it was discussed here. I don't want the info so I ain't looking up the old thread.

 

My state has 5 for football

11AA
11A
11B
9A
9B

It will probably add another somewhere in the middle soon.

 

I've heard of that state, it rhymes with Sindiana.

And it's the stupidest system I've come across, especially for football.

 

Montana has four classes. Everybody makes the playoffs in every sports, IIRC. One class, the biggest, only has 12 schools in it.

Now I know I got my start in Indiana/Illinois, but four classes out here is just flat out ridiculous. It was stupid in Indiana, and it's stupider out here.

Semi-rant over.

 

Illinois wants to go to four classes next school year (2007-08). Big mistake.

 

I'd be interested in seeing the breakdown for that. Are the small schools simply going to get screwed, or will there be an attempt to balance the field by enrollment?

Going from six classes to eight was flat-out dumb. I may not mind seeing a four-class system if it's done right.

 

Wyoming does power ratings. There have been some serious snafus with that, not the least of which was a Class 5A school going 2-6 in the regular season with one win against a shitty Montana team and the other win against a Class 4A school. Yes, this team went 0-6 against its own classification in Wyoming and enjoyed the privilege of being first-round fodder. Wyomoing also has been known to let travel distance dictate who plays whom in the first round of the playoffs.

I almost forgot to mention a state with 70-odd football-playing schools has five goddamned classes.

 

I get your stance.... yet it seems to me the best team in each class tends to win, year afer year.