I understand your point about 5a schools playing 8a etc but Naz-Marist historically are pretty even tough games. The last two years are the outlier.
2008 Naz 35, Marist 21
2009 Marist 35, Naz 14
2010 Marist 21, Naz 14
2011 Naz 33, Marist 20
2012 Marist 24, Naz 21
2013 Marist 42, Naz 37
2014 Naz 37, Marist 21
2015 Naz 62, Marist 45
2016 Marist 44, Naz 14
2017 Marist 42, Naz 0
Better than expected but two of these years Nazareth was good enough to win a state championship. Those years (being their only state titles to date) could be called outliers and if you remove those two (14-15) it’s 6-2 Marist. And Marist isn’t as good as Loyola and I’m not saying nazareth can’t play a Marist or a Loyola every year (as they currently do in the ESCC) if they lose its one loss. But if you put them in with Loyola, Marist, and say Mount Carmel in a division they on some years are going to be 0-3 and up against it especially if they get tough crossovers that year. And let’s face it, Nazareth being good at football is a recent phenomenon and there is no guarantee of what’s to come... the smaller the school the more cyclical it can be.... big schools like Loyola, Marist, Mount Carmel are less cyclical and they have proven this with sustained success over time.