This year is great example of why it only allows 5A-size East St. Louis to play 6A and not play 7A or 8A.
The two other playoff teams from their league are going to be 7A Edwardsville and 8A Belleville East.
Schools in a conference are partners and partners want to see each other succeed, preferably not at the cost of hurting each other.
By making EStL play 6A, it obviously increases the chances of Edwardsville having great success in 7A and Belleville East the same in 8A.
Placing EStL in 7A or 8A creates a Lord of the Flies situation in which league partners are eating each other.
Obviously, other conferences in the state have multiple teams in the same class as playoff rematches happen all the time.
But in cases involving public schools, a team moving up one or more classes intentionally to avoid other teams in the same conference obviously puts the school moving up at a disadvantage but does not harm conference partners in the bigger class.
If Rochester for example moves up from let’s say 4A to 6A, then Rochester is making it harder on itself and not harming league partners who might also be in 6A.
The EStL case is unique in that if the Flyers move up to 7A or 8A, they are harming their conference partners rather than themselves.
Finally, EStL is moving up from 5A to 6A where there are no conference partners located.
Playing 6A is best for the conference as a whole in the play.
And heck, one of the reasons I suspect the Chicago Catholic League/East Suburban Catholic has the four/team conferences is to maximize the number of teams in playoffs.
It makes sense for the CCL/ESCC to do that, and it also makes sense for the conference to do what it is doing with EStL.