The IHSA football advisory committee has a plan to change the playoffs. Teams now qualify by earning five regular-season victories, but the committee is offering a plan that calls for teams to be assigned to eight-team or nine-team districts. The eight football classes would have eight districts based upon enrollment and geography. The top four teams in each district would qualify for a 32-team bracket in each class. Teams still would play a nine-game schedule, but only district games would count for postseason consideration.
Iowa and Missouri also use districts, with slight differences, to determine postseason opponents.
The next step for the committee is to develop a formal proposal that details the district format, and then share it with member schools for consideration during the IHSA by-law amendment process in November. If the member schools approve the proposal, the earliest the district format could be in place would be for the 2019 season.
