Back by popular demand: my annual playoff mismatch rant

[doctor_d]

Problem is that there’s no way to do that equitably.
The “dynasty formula” is interesting, but still flawed and would create other undesirable consequences.
It’s basically the same argument about the private school multiplier/waiver. Not all small/mid private schools in our great state are IC or Naz. Not all programs and especially year to year teams are created equal. The yearly ebbs and flows that many teams endure would make it nearly impossible to predict and create a nirvana where every deserving team made the playoffs with extremely consistent competitive games. I think the result would be that most of the schools with under 400 or 500 enrollment would be universally excluded.

 

[lurker74]

Regardless of how teams are seeded, sports are full of blowouts. Forget the truly overmatched teams in the first couple rounds.

Because I have too much time on my hands this morning....

The last 8 seasons of quarterfinals thru finals (the "final 8" in each class), there have been 448 games played. 228 of them were more than 2 score finishes (17+ points). That's 50.9% of games, even after the weaker teams have been eliminated.

Go to 6 classes??? The last 3 seasons of 6 classes listed on IHSA, so 126 games. 57 were 17+ points. 45.2%. So better, but it's not a magic fix.

 

[eireog]

I think people overestimate how popular the 'open' classes would be. Coaches, players, schools want titles, not to always play the best competition.

Not to beat a dead horse, but pretty much everyone would consider MC a "top 3" team in the state, and they don't move up from 7A. Teams can petition up now. How many do?

I think if you only recognized 2 teams as state champions, you’d have plenty of teams that would petition for the 2 open classes.

 

[doctor_d]

I think if you only recognized 2 teams as state champions, you’d have plenty of teams that would petition for the 2 open classes.

As if one open class wasn’t preposterous enough, you are suggesting two?
Where would Byron fit, for example? Or Lena-Winslow? Or one of the 2A north contenders?
I don’t think any of those 1A-3A teams would fit in with an only two open class two state champ system. Again, this is disregarding smaller schools.
The 3A title game in particular has been excellent over the past decade when ICCP wasn’t involved.
This open class talk is too short sighted.

 

[iamgroot]

The following data pertains to the 128 first round football playoff games recently completed. The numbers in brackets reflect similar data from 2022, 2021, 2017, and 2016, respectively.

Why no 2018? Did the data not match?

 

[eireog]

As if one open class wasn’t preposterous enough, you are suggesting two?
Where would Byron fit, for example? Or Lena-Winslow? Or one of the 2A north contenders?
I don’t think any of those 1A-3A teams would fit in with an only two open class two state champ system. Again, this is disregarding smaller schools.
The 3A title game in particular has been excellent over the past decade when ICCP wasn’t involved.
This open class talk is too short sighted.

One large class 8A and one small class 4A.

 

[mc140]

Me too but I’d say two open classes. Say 8A and 4A.

Anyone can petition now to play in 8a and only Loyola has.

 

[eireog]

Anyone can petition now to play in 8a and only Loyola has.

If only 2 state champions were recognized I’d imagine a lot of teams would petition up.

 

[ramblinman]

Why no 2018? Did the data not match?

Just skipped 18, 19 and the pandemic year. No hidden agenda as to why. Just did.

 

[HotBeer]

It comes down to:

• This happens in every state
• The job of IHSA is not to create spectator-pleasing matchups like the NFL. It's to equitably organize a playoff system for schools of all sizes, in a rules-based manner that teams can understand.

I'm not saying there aren't potential improvements to be made, but alot of these hairbrained ideas are the work of message-board superfans and detached from the mission of the IHSA and the desires of the schools themselves.

 

[iamgroot]

Part of the inducement to keep 256 teams in the playoffs is equitable access, sure, but its also about $$$. Football is IHSA's cash cow. With the vast majority of revenues from the gate going to IHSA, reducing from 8 classes to 6 classes is a 25% drop in revenue. Keeping 8 classes, but removing the first round would cut revenues by like 45% (50% fewer games, but gate prices go up the closer you get to the final)

 

[crazylegs777]

If you believe the regular season should matter, then you need to seed the playoffs. If you seed the playoffs, you will get mismatches in the first round. If you don't believe the regular season should matter, like the Indiana High School Association, they you random draw the playoffs and you get top seeds playing each other in the first round. Pick your poison. Also, for the record, I don't think that the amount of classes should be reduced. I am all for more teams and kids being involved and having a chance to play for something. Don't forget that football teaches a ton of great life lessons, and the more kids that can get those lessons, the better. At least in my book.

Exactly.It's not everybody gets a trophy but you qualify you get in.Funny thing is the "King" of the CPS who i have zero respect for says CPS Blue don't deserve to get into the state playoffs.They'll get killed.Wth do you think is going on with 2/3rds of the other CPS now? And on top of that to not let them play in the city playoffs? Oppression at it's best

 

[chiliconcarne2]

Exactly.It's not everybody gets a trophy but you qualify you get in.Funny thing is the "King" of the CPS who i have zero respect for says CPS Blue don't deserve to get into the state playoffs.They'll get killed.Wth do you think is going on with 2/3rds of the other CPS now? And on top of that to not let them play in the city playoffs? Oppression at it's best

who is the king

 

[LHSTigers94]

Spot on. It's cool to see when teams petition up, but it often comes out as a net negative.

Loyola opting up last year was noble of them, but it denied us a MC/LA rematch.

ESL opting up to 6A is cool, but I think there are more teams that would give them a game at 5A to be honest.

Rita opting up to 7A is a headscratcher. They got beaten handily their last time in 5A and would have been fairly competitive in 5A and 6A this season and maybe been able to win a few games or make a run. Instead, they got walloped by MC.

The only schools where it makes sense to opt up may be a run of dominance or a clear "you should be competing in a higher class" feeling.

MC in 7A is it, but they don't opt up.

ESL should opt up, but they go as high as they can and 6A is questionably as deep as 5A.

The only others that probably should are Lena-Winslow, Rochester, and maybe IC. But I am already getting my popcorn for that IC-Rochester game in 4A, so I am happy they are both 4A.

In 5A there are schools from the neighboring MVC (Highland, Mascoutah, Triad, etc) therefore, 6A is the only class with no local schools participating. I don't see a switch from 6A anytime soon.

 

[FalconPadre]

Seeding system with the results of a coaches poll, media poll and IHSA playoff points. How each contributing result is weighted to determine the final results would need to be tested.

 

[iamgroot]

Seeding system with the results of a coaches poll, media poll and IHSA playoff points. How each contributing result is weighted to determine the final results would need to be tested.

How about CalPreps since its independent and looks at overall strength of schedule via a formula and not just someone's gut?

 

[FalconPadre]

How about CalPreps since its independent and looks at overall strength of schedule via a formula and not just someone's gut?

Good call. Add it to the mix.

 

[ramblinman]

It comes down to:

• This happens in every state
• The job of IHSA is not to create spectator-pleasing matchups like the NFL. It's to equitably organize a playoff system for schools of all sizes, in a rules-based manner that teams can understand.

I'm not saying there aren't potential improvements to be made, but alot of these hairbrained ideas are the work of message-board superfans and detached from the mission of the IHSA and the desires of the schools themselves.

Really good points. Glad you are open to making improvements.

If the job of the IHSA is to equitably organize a playoff system, please explain what is equitable about creating enrollment-based classes where 46% of the first round games witness a team scoring less than 10 points and 41% of those games are decided by margins of 30 points or greater?

How equitable are these scores...

Belleville East 70, Aurora East 0
LWE 56, Taft 0
South Elgin 55, Lane 6
Batavia 46, Brother Rice 0
Normal Community 43, Argo 0
Geneva 50, Senn 8
Cary Grove 49, Libertyville 6
Highland Park 56, Mather 6
ESL 61, Lemont 0

Are games like those above really "the desires of the schools themselves"? And the above are just a couple of handfuls of scores with victory margins greater than 42 points (6 TDS and 6 PATs) from just three classes. I could have found many, many more.

How equitable is the current system with enrollment-based classes that feature huge disparities of competitive level from top to bottom? How many more ridiculous drubbings must there be before someone with a modicum of compassion and common sense says, "ENOUGH ALREADY"? If 70-0 games aren't bad enough, what would be? 100-0? Keep in mind that scores of 70-0 happen despite running clocks. What's the point of games like that?

In 6A alone, 7 of the 16 first round games were decided by margins of 40 points or more. 11 of the 16 were decided by 30 points or more. How many is too many? Where do you draw the line?

 

[HotBeer]

Really good points. Glad you are open to making improvements.

If the job of the IHSA is to equitably organize a playoff system, please explain what is equitable about creating enrollment-based classes where 46% of the first round games witness a team scoring less than 10 points and 41% of those games are decided by margins of 30 points or greater?

How equitable are these scores...

Belleville East 70, Aurora East 0
LWE 56, Taft 0
South Elgin 55, Lane 6
Batavia 46, Brother Rice 0
Normal Community 43, Argo 0
Geneva 50, Senn 8
Cary Grove 49, Libertyville 6
Highland Park 56, Mather 6
ESL 61, Lemont 0

Are games like those above really "the desires of the schools themselves"? And the above are just a couple of handfuls of scores with victory margins greater than 42 points (6 TDS and 6 PATs) from just three classes. I could have found many, many more.

How equitable is the current system with enrollment-based classes that feature huge disparities of competitive level from top to bottom? How many more ridiculous drubbings must there be before someone a modicum of compassion and common sense says, "ENOUGH ALREADY"? If 70-0 games aren't bad enough, what would be? 100-0? Keep in mind that scores of 70-0 happen despite running clocks. What's the point of games like that?

In 6A alone, 7 of the 16 first round games were decided by margins of 40 points or more. 11 of the 16 were decided by 30 points or more. How many is too many? Where do you draw the line?

The definition of "equitable" is "fair and impartial", not "evenly matched". It's sort of laughable that you are surprised or outraged that an enrollment-based class has a huge talent disparity from top to bottom... one team is the eventual state champion and another is the 32nd qualifier... Just like any tournament.

In my post you quoted, I literally said I am open to improvements so if you have an idea for a rules-based framework that evenly represents the IHSA's constituent schools and reduces competitive discrepancies in the playoffs, please share it, I'm genuinely interested.

Whether you like it or not, reducing 1st round blowouts is not an IHSA mandate and they happen in every state across the country.

 

[4Afan]

Really good points. Glad you are open to making improvements.

If the job of the IHSA is to equitably organize a playoff system, please explain what is equitable about creating enrollment-based classes where 46% of the first round games witness a team scoring less than 10 points and 41% of those games are decided by margins of 30 points or greater?

How equitable are these scores...

Belleville East 70, Aurora East 0
LWE 56, Taft 0
South Elgin 55, Lane 6
Batavia 46, Brother Rice 0
Normal Community 43, Argo 0
Geneva 50, Senn 8
Cary Grove 49, Libertyville 6
Highland Park 56, Mather 6
ESL 61, Lemont 0

Are games like those above really "the desires of the schools themselves"? And the above are just a couple of handfuls of scores with victory margins greater than 42 points (6 TDS and 6 PATs) from just three classes. I could have found many, many more.

How equitable is the current system with enrollment-based classes that feature huge disparities of competitive level from top to bottom? How many more ridiculous drubbings must there be before someone a modicum of compassion and common sense says, "ENOUGH ALREADY"? If 70-0 games aren't bad enough, what would be? 100-0? Keep in mind that scores of 70-0 happen despite running clocks. What's the point of games like that?

In 6A alone, 7 of the 16 first round games were decided by margins of 40 points or more. 11 of the 16 were decided by 30 points or more. How many is too many? Where do you draw the line?

There is no easy fix, I am open to changes but ultimately nothing will give you the results you are looking for. No system will prevent blowouts.

Ultimately I think it is due to the fact that football in Illinois is top heavy and not nearly enough parity. In each class there are 3-5 powers who make deep runs and win state year in and year out. Then there are those programs that have generational talents come through every so often that make deep runs for a few years and then go back to being one and done or missing the playoffs. There's nothing that can be done about this. There is no fix all system that is going to give us 7 point games in the first round through the finals.

 

[ramblinman]

Problem is that there’s no way to do that equitably.

Problem is the current equitable classification system produces competitively imbalanced classes.

The yearly ebbs and flows that many teams endure would make it nearly impossible to predict and create a nirvana where every deserving team made the playoffs with extremely consistent competitive games.

Agreed. But that doesn't mean that we shouldn't strive to make the classes more competively balananced.

I think the result would be that most of the schools with under 400 or 500 enrollment would be universally excluded.

I'm not suggesting that we should change the playoff qualification system. -- just they way that the teams that do qualify are classified.

 

[HotBeer]

Problem is the current equitable classification system produces competitively imbalanced classes.



Agreed. But that doesn't mean that we shouldn't strive to make the classes more competively balananced.



I'm not suggesting that we should change the playoff qualification system. -- just they way that the teams that do qualify are classified.

Right now, in Illinois and most (all?) other states, the object of a state tournament is to determine the best team among peers of similar size. Example: the "champion of 4A" this year will be the best team from a school with ~600-800 kids. (Plus one multiplied smaller school, IC Catholic).

If I'm understanding you correctly, you want to take the existing universe of qualifiers, and group them by some determination of "how good they are". You have now created something completely removed from any state championship I am aware of. The 1A state championship is now the "consolation championship game among the teams we deemed to be the 224th-256th best in the state", which feels pretty meaningless. This board would have an absolute MELTDOWN when Glenbard West beats Lena-Winslow for the RamblinMan 5A "state championship".

 

[ramblinman]

It's sort of laughable that you are surprised or outraged that an enrollment-based class has a huge talent disparity from top to bottom... one team is the eventual state champion and another is the 32nd qualifier... Just like any tournament.

It doesn't surprise me at all.

Outraged? War is an outrage. Hatred is an outrage. Discrimination is an outrage. What we are talking about in terms of the playoffs is unfortunate.

What surprises me is how content you and others are with the status quo which is far from perfect and which you yourself acknowledged that improvements could be made.

In my post you quoted, I literally said I am open to improvements so if you have an idea for a rules-based framework that evenly represents the IHSA's constituent schools and reduces competitive discrepancies in the playoffs, please share it, I'm genuinely interested.

I, personally, don't have a system to propose. I know the end result I'd like to see, which is more evenly balanced classes, but I leave the ins and outs of the system to others with more time and abilities than me to design it. @stonedlizard created the framework of such a system a few years back. Perhaps he will jump in at some point with a summary of it.

Whether you like it or not, reducing 1st round blowouts is not an IHSA mandate and they happen in every state across the country.

I understand that reducing blowouts isn't a mandate. Does that mean that they're acceptable because they aren't a mandate? Yes, they happen in every state across the country. I'm only talking about Illinois. I don't care about any other state. I'm not looking to eliminate blowouts because that is unrealistic. It isn't unrealistic to reduce them, and neither is it unreasonable to want to reduce them...whether you like it or not.

 

[HotBeer]

It doesn't surprise me at all.

Outraged? War is an outrage. Hatred is an outrage. Discrimination is an outrage. What we are talking about in terms of the playoffs is unfortunate.

What surprises me is how content you and others are with the status quo which is far from perfect and which you yourself acknowledged that improvements could be made.



I, personally, don't have a system to propose. I know the end result I'd like to see, which is more evenly balanced classes, but I leave the ins and outs of the system to others with more time and abilities than me to design it. @stonedlizard created the framework of such a system a few years back. Perhaps he will jump in at some point with a summary of it.



I understand that reducing blowouts isn't a mandate. Does that mean that they're acceptable because they aren't a mandate? Yes, they happen in every state across the country. I'm only talking about Illinois. I don't care about any other state. I'm not looking to eliminate blowouts because that is unrealistic. It isn't unrealistic to reduce them, and neither is it unreasonable to want to reduce them...whether you like it or not.

You don't like blowouts. You have no solution to fix them. You know it's not in the IHSA's purview. But you wish there would be less.

I actually agree with all of that completely.

 

[ramblinman]

Right now, in Illinois and most (all?) other states, the object of a state tournament is to determine the best team among peers of similar size.

Again, I don't care about any other state. Are you a follower or a leader? Do you like to follow what everyone else wants to do like lemmings jumping off the cliff, or are you really open like you said you were to making improvements?

If I'm understanding you correctly, you want to take the existing universe of qualifiers, and group them by some determination of "how good they are". You have now created something completely removed from any state championship I am aware of.

God forbid that Illinois should blaze its own trail and not be a lemming. 🤣

The 1A state championship is now the "consolation championship game among the teams we deemed to be the 224th-256th best in the stte",

...out of 500+ total teams playing football. Think it's meaningless being the 224th best? Get better so that next year you play up a class. If you weren't so accustomed to the enrollment based classification system, you wouldn't know any different. Try thinking out of the box on this.

This board would have an absolute MELTDOWN when Glenbard West beats Lena-Winslow for the RamblinMan 5A "state championship".

So what? At least they would meltdown about SOMETHING instead of being lemmings and silently acceptiing a deeply flawed status quo.

 

[crazylegs777]

Really good points. Glad you are open to making improvements.

If the job of the IHSA is to equitably organize a playoff system, please explain what is equitable about creating enrollment-based classes where 46% of the first round games witness a team scoring less than 10 points and 41% of those games are decided by margins of 30 points or greater?

How equitable are these scores...

Belleville East 70, Aurora East 0
LWE 56, Taft 0
South Elgin 55, Lane 6
Batavia 46, Brother Rice 0
Normal Community 43, Argo 0
Geneva 50, Senn 8
Cary Grove 49, Libertyville 6
Highland Park 56, Mather 6
ESL 61, Lemont 0

Are games like those above really "the desires of the schools themselves"? And the above are just a couple of handfuls of scores with victory margins greater than 42 points (6 TDS and 6 PATs) from just three classes. I could have found many, many more.

How equitable is the current system with enrollment-based classes that feature huge disparities of competitive level from top to bottom? How many more ridiculous drubbings must there be before someone a modicum of compassion and common sense says, "ENOUGH ALREADY"? If 70-0 games aren't bad enough, what would be? 100-0? Keep in mind that scores of 70-0 happen despite running clocks. What's the point of games like that?

In 6A alone, 7 of the 16 first round games were decided by margins of 40 points or more. 11 of the 16 were decided by 30 points or more. How many is too many? Where do you draw the line?

Argo is trying hard to build it's program up.2 years in a row making the playoffs.They got running clocked in round 1 each year so that needs to change.Both years 5-5 & continuous blowout losses to EP & Richards & they are better than that.They need to go to the next level which is 6-3,7-2 or better,host a playoff game or 2 & win some playoff games.

 

[crazylegs777]

Again, I don't care about any other state. Are you a follower or a leader? Do you like to follow what everyone else wants to do like lemmings jumping off the cliff, or are you really open like you said you were to making improvements?



God forbid that Illinois should blaze its own trail and not be a lemming. 🤣



...out of 500+ total teams playing football. Think it's meaningless being the 224th best? Get better so that next year you play up a class. If you weren't so accustomed to the enrollment based classification system, you wouldn't know any different. Try thinking out of the box on this.



So what? At least they would meltdown about SOMETHING instead of being lemmings and silently acceptiing a deeply flawed status quo.

Illinois not playing the season a few years ago was a joke.Indiana & Tennessee had very few issues

 

[ramblinman]

There is no easy fix, I am open to changes but ultimately nothing will give you the results you are looking for. No system will prevent blowouts.

I understand that, and I'm not angling for that. What I am angling for is that people first acknowledge that it is a problem. Once the problem is acknowledged, then let's put our heads together and figure out how to lessen the consequences of that problem.

 

[iamgroot]

Illinois not playing the season a few years ago was a joke.Indiana & Tennessee had very few issues

There wasn't a roadmap a few years ago. It is easy to Monday quarterback and say things were fine, but in the moment, we didn't actually know. Let's not take the conversation any further in this direction lest it get flushed for politics.

 

[ramblinman]

You don't like blowouts.

True.

You have no solution to fix them.

Untrue. My solution is to puke the classification system and make a better one.

You know it's not in the IHSA's purview.

Says you. The IHSA can do whatever they want.

But you wish there would be less.

True.

I actually agree with all of that completely.

Good.

 

[stonedlizard]

It doesn't surprise me at all.

Outraged? War is an outrage. Hatred is an outrage. Discrimination is an outrage. What we are talking about in terms of the playoffs is unfortunate.

What surprises me is how content you and others are with the status quo which is far from perfect and which you yourself acknowledged that improvements could be made.



I, personally, don't have a system to propose. I know the end result I'd like to see, which is more evenly balanced classes, but I leave the ins and outs of the system to others with more time and abilities than me to design it. @stonedlizard created the framework of such a system a few years back. Perhaps he will jump in at some point with a summary of it.



I understand that reducing blowouts isn't a mandate. Does that mean that they're acceptable because they aren't a mandate? Yes, they happen in every state across the country. I'm only talking about Illinois. I don't care about any other state. I'm not looking to eliminate blowouts because that is unrealistic. It isn't unrealistic to reduce them, and neither is it unreasonable to want to reduce them...whether you like it or not.

For the uninitiated it’s pretty straight forward math…

- teams earn points for wins/losses, the amount earned is based on the “pre season class” an opponent is slotted into in the beginning of the year
- higher the class an opponent is in, the more points earned win or loss; playoffs also worth more than regular season
- 256 teams make the playoffs and are stack ranked into their “playoff class” ie top 32 teams by power points go to 8A, so on and so forth
- at the end of the season, the total power points earned by a team across regular season and playoffs are used, alongside power point results from prior two seasons, to place a team in a “pre season class” prior to the start of the next year


What’s more fun is the way the framework plays out over time. Teams, based on who they schedule and the strength of their performance, have theoretical flexibility to move up all the way to “8A”.

With enough time, most likely settle into a pre and post season classification within +/- 2 classes of their current enrollment based classification (but that can have a huge competitive equity based difference for those teams and classes).

 

[gobears25]

...out of 500+ total teams playing football. Think it's meaningless being the 224th best? Get better so that next year you play up a class. If you weren't so accustomed to the enrollment based classification system, you wouldn't know any different. Try thinking out of the box on this.

Are you intentionally implying your perfect system would have one state champion out of a 500+ team or is that incidental? Might as well just have Loyola MC week 9 game determine The One True State Champ and rank the rest of the schools based on how many points you think Loyola would score on them, no playoffs necessary.

Outraged? War is an outrage. Hatred is an outrage. Discrimination is an outrage. What we are talking about in terms of the playoffs is unfortunate.

Pretentiousness on a high school football message board? Not as cool as you might think, Hawkeye

 

[stonedlizard]

For the uninitiated it’s pretty straight forward math…

- teams earn points for wins/losses, the amount earned is based on the “pre season class” an opponent is slotted into in the beginning of the year
- higher the class an opponent is in, the more points earned win or loss; playoffs also worth more than regular season
- 256 teams make the playoffs and are stack ranked into their “playoff class” ie top 32 teams by power points go to 8A, so on and so forth
- at the end of the season, the total power points earned by a team across regular season and playoffs are used, alongside power point results from prior two seasons, to place a team in a “pre season class” prior to the start of the next year


What’s more fun is the way the framework plays out over time. Teams, based on who they schedule and the strength of their performance, have theoretical flexibility to move up all the way to “8A”.

With enough time, most likely settle into a pre and post season classification within +/- 2 classes of their current enrollment based classification (but that can have a huge competitive equity based difference for those teams and classes).

And in 2016 when there was the luxury of time to fully calculate the 2014-2015 power points, mock the 2016 pre season classifications, calculate the 2016 regular season power points, determine the playoff classes, and dig into the weeds of a few scenarios, the framework appeared to do a few things really well:

- reward teams who consistently play tough schedules with a higher competitive classification
- reward teams who consistently win regular and post season games with a higher competitive classification
- provide flexibility for team’s competitive classification to adjust down after multiple down years
- account for the “CPS scenarios”
- provide equitable opportunities (importantly not outcomes) for public vs privates

Should you choose, you can follow the white rabbit here, but be warned it’ll require a little bit of mid-2010s IHSA history to resonate (crazy how time flies…):

Thread 'Make the Playoffs Great Again'
https://edgytim.forums.rivals.com/threads/make-the-playoffs-great-again.12046/

 

[stonedlizard]

Appreciate this rant as I do I just ask what do we do?

Look to innovations and systems used in CA and MI to start…

 

[stonedlizard]

Regardless of how teams are seeded, sports are full of blowouts. Forget the truly overmatched teams in the first couple rounds.

Because I have too much time on my hands this morning....

The last 8 seasons of quarterfinals thru finals (the "final 8" in each class), there have been 448 games played. 228 of them were more than 2 score finishes (17+ points). That's 50.9% of games, even after the weaker teams have been eliminated.

Go to 6 classes??? The last 3 seasons of 6 classes listed on IHSA, so 126 games. 57 were 17+ points. 45.2%. So better, but it's not a magic fix.

One could also consider this proof that enrollment based classifications, whether 6 or 8 classifications, don’t product competitive equity…

 

[gobucsgo]

Who would want to do that? And who would want to seed that?
Can you imagine a team that is somewhere about the 32nd seed of any class? Coach be like. Well boys. If we lose,we will be a higher seed in the lower class. Like 4a said. A trophy is a trophy. So if I lose my last regular season game. And I win a state trophy in a lower class. I get to tell my kids. We get
To play on Thanksgiving weekend. And not get the stuffing beat out of me in the first round. The 32nd seed is still going to be an underdog no matter how you slice it.

 

[stonedlizard]

Who would want to do that? And who would want to seed that?
Can you imagine a team that is somewhere about the 32nd seed of any class? Coach be like. Well boys. If we lose,we will be a higher seed in the lower class. Like 4a said. A trophy is a trophy. So if I lose my last regular season game. And I win a state trophy in a lower class. I get to tell my kids. We get
To play on Thanksgiving weekend. And not get the stuffing beat out of me in the first round. The 32nd seed is still going to be an underdog no matter how you slice it.

Seeding and playoff classification not exactly the same thing but you’ve made a similar point here that a few others have made over the years.

Perhaps, in the extreme, it’s a potential in this type of system, but a 5-4 team is going to be on the bottom end of the playoff classes 1-32 seeds as will a 9-0 team be on the upper half. If you use the framework to game it out I don’t see it being as feasible as you might think with a hot take.

 

[stonedlizard]

And in 2016 when there was the luxury of time to fully calculate the 2014-2015 power points, mock the 2016 pre season classifications, calculate the 2016 regular season power points, determine the playoff classes, and dig into the weeds of a few scenarios, the framework appeared to do a few things really well:

- reward teams who consistently play tough schedules with a higher competitive classification
- reward teams who consistently win regular and post season games with a higher competitive classification
- provide flexibility for team’s competitive classification to adjust down after multiple down years
- account for the “CPS scenarios”
- provide equitable opportunities (importantly not outcomes) for public vs privates

Should you choose, you can follow the white rabbit here, but be warned it’ll require a little bit of mid-2010s IHSA history to resonate (crazy how time flies…):

Thread 'Make the Playoffs Great Again'
https://edgytim.forums.rivals.com/threads/make-the-playoffs-great-again.12046/

It’s also interesting to look back at re-classified playoffs teams from 2016 and realize how well a lot of those changes would apply today

 

[missingwalter]

Really good points. Glad you are open to making improvements.

If the job of the IHSA is to equitably organize a playoff system, please explain what is equitable about creating enrollment-based classes where 46% of the first round games witness a team scoring less than 10 points and 41% of those games are decided by margins of 30 points or greater?

How equitable are these scores...

Belleville East 70, Aurora East 0
LWE 56, Taft 0
South Elgin 55, Lane 6
Batavia 46, Brother Rice 0
Normal Community 43, Argo 0
Geneva 50, Senn 8
Cary Grove 49, Libertyville 6
Highland Park 56, Mather 6
ESL 61, Lemont 0

Are games like those above really "the desires of the schools themselves"? And the above are just a couple of handfuls of scores with victory margins greater than 42 points (6 TDS and 6 PATs) from just three classes. I could have found many, many more.

How equitable is the current system with enrollment-based classes that feature huge disparities of competitive level from top to bottom? How many more ridiculous drubbings must there be before someone with a modicum of compassion and common sense says, "ENOUGH ALREADY"? If 70-0 games aren't bad enough, what would be? 100-0? Keep in mind that scores of 70-0 happen despite running clocks. What's the point of games like that?

In 6A alone, 7 of the 16 first round games were decided by margins of 40 points or more. 11 of the 16 were decided by 30 points or more. How many is too many? Where do you draw the line?

I can 100% tell you that EA and its fans were very happy to be there.

 

[ramblinman]

I can 100% tell you that EA and its fans were very happy to be there.

After a 41-year playoff drought, they can't afford to be picky.