You read that correctly.

Wood County Schools, which includes Parkersburg High School and Parkersburg South High School, both near Marietta, Ohio, filed an injunction with the state's court system requesting that the West Virginia Secondary School Activities Commission (WVSSAC) re-seed their playoff brackets after they felt local teams in their brackets had not been seeded correctly. The injunction was granted by the court this past Saturday and the WVSSAC was forced to go back and re-seed, resulting in 4 teams being taken out of the playoffs and 4 teams (including Parkersburg High School) being added into the playoffs in their place.

Cabell County Schools have filed a similar injunction that is yet to have been decided upon by the court system.
 

West Virginia high school football playoff rankings changed after injunctions filed | WBOY 12

The WVSSAC has postponed all playoff games around the state for this week while the litigation continues.

This is interesting. How long could this be potentially drawn out?

We’re the reclassifications made objectively (student #s?), but just too late for programs to adjust schedules?  Guess I just don’t know enough to understand why the courts would be involved to the potential detriment of so many.

23 minutes ago, JagNation said:

This is interesting. How long could this be potentially drawn out?

That's a great question.

17 minutes ago, Oldercoach said:

We’re the reclassifications made objectively (student #s?), but just too late for programs to adjust schedules?  Guess I just don’t know enough to understand why the courts would be involved to the potential detriment of so many.

Quite honestly, I'm not sure of what exact changes took place to make the school districts decide to get the courts involved.

I saw one article that mentioned the WVSSAC as having announced last December that they were reclassifying. I also found a Sports Illustrated article that mentioned the WVSSAC having proposed a 5-class system...which would benefit the smaller schools' chances at playoff births simply by the fact that there would be 5 playoff brackets instead of 4. But then it looks like they are still operating under a 4-class system this year. So I'm not exactly how that shakes out in regard to this.

Similar to our RPI system in Kentucky, the WVSSAC has a multiplier that is factored in for teams that win against bigger schools. So based on declassifications and opponents moving up or down when game contracts are already in place, that could result in a team playing someone out of contractual obligation after the opponent had dropped in classification....so then the win over the that opponent would mean less after reclassification than it would have meant prior to reclassification.

Long story short, though, this suit is about how the state's teams were classified, which happened prior to the regular season starting. Injunctions being filed at this stage of the game, to me, seem to be a move for leverage by holding the WVSSAC and the start of the state's playoffs hostage while the schools fight in court to get what they want.

On the surface, I absolutely hate this. 

4 minutes ago, TheDeuce said:

On the surface, I absolutely hate this. 

Saaaaaaaame here.

54 minutes ago, Colonels_Wear_Blue said:

Quite honestly, I'm not sure of what exact changes took place to make the school districts decide to get the courts involved.

I saw one article that mentioned the WVSSAC as having announced last December that they were reclassifying. I also found a Sports Illustrated article that mentioned the WVSSAC having proposed a 5-class system...which would benefit the smaller schools' chances at playoff births simply by the fact that there would be 5 playoff brackets instead of 4. But then it looks like they are still operating under a 4-class system this year. So I'm not exactly how that shakes out in regard to this.

Similar to our RPI system in Kentucky, the WVSSAC has a multiplier that is factored in for teams that win against bigger schools. So based on declassifications and opponents moving up or down when game contracts are already in place, that could result in a team playing someone out of contractual obligation after the opponent had dropped in classification....so then the win over the that opponent would mean less after reclassification than it would have meant prior to reclassification.

Long story short, though, this suit is about how the state's teams were classified, which happened prior to the regular season starting. Injunctions being filed at this stage of the game, to me, seem to be a move for leverage by holding the WVSSAC and the start of the state's playoffs hostage while the schools fight in court to get what they want.

Appears to me your conclusions are spot-on.

Short version of the situation.

Very late, right before the season started they decided to create a 4th class for football.  All games had already been long scheduled.  They set their playoffs by computer ranking similar to RPI.  Where the fight has started is how to calculate games.  Example a game was scheduled as a 3a vs 3a school,  at the last second the state changes one team to 4a,  does that count as two teams playing in the same class, or one team playing a class up? The state decided one way to count it and the playoffs were set, some of the schools that were left out because of this technicality went to court, the court changed the playoffs, when they changed it, it knocked other schools out of the playoffs, now they have gone to court saying they should be in and two different judges have ruled in favor of both groups.  So now they have to wait on the courts to decide what to do because the state screwed everything up big time.  Its a complete mess. 

2 hours ago, Colonels_Wear_Blue said:

I saw one article that mentioned the WVSSAC as having announced last December that they were reclassifying. I also found a Sports Illustrated article that mentioned the WVSSAC having proposed a 5-class system...which would benefit the smaller schools' chances at playoff births simply by the fact that there would be 5 playoff brackets instead of 4. But then it looks like they are still operating under a 4-class system this year. So I'm not exactly how that shakes out in regard to this.

 

10 minutes ago, Colonel 17 said:

Short version of the situation.

Very late, right before the season started they decided to create a 4th class for football.  All games had already been long scheduled.  They set their playoffs by computer ranking similar to RPI.  Where the fight has started is how to calculate games.  Example a game was scheduled as a 3a vs 3a school,  at the last second the state changes one team to 4a,  does that count as two teams playing in the same class, or one team playing a class up? The state decided one way to count it and the playoffs were set, some of the schools that were left out because of this technicality went to court, the court changed the playoffs, when they changed it, it knocked other schools out of the playoffs, now they have gone to court saying they should be in and two different judges have ruled in favor of both groups.  So now they have to wait on the courts to decide what to do because the state screwed everything up big time.  Its a complete mess. 

Thanks for that, Colonel. I read a few more articles and was starting to wonder if the "five classes" reference from the Sports Illustrated article was incorrect. You confirmed it for me.

Easy solution. All teams get into the playoffs. 

20 hours ago, Voice of Reason said:

Easy solution. All teams get into the playoffs. 

Yeah! And then some of them can forfeit! 

@Tigerpride94 posted an article on this situation in the "controversial issues" section on Tuesday.

I thought it was odd it didn't get much attention/traction based on the many opinions on the Kentucky football playoffs.

On 11/13/2024 at 12:33 PM, Colonel 17 said:

Short version of the situation.

Very late, right before the season started they decided to create a 4th class for football.  All games had already been long scheduled.  They set their playoffs by computer ranking similar to RPI.  Where the fight has started is how to calculate games.  Example a game was scheduled as a 3a vs 3a school,  at the last second the state changes one team to 4a,  does that count as two teams playing in the same class, or one team playing a class up? The state decided one way to count it and the playoffs were set, some of the schools that were left out because of this technicality went to court, the court changed the playoffs, when they changed it, it knocked other schools out of the playoffs, now they have gone to court saying they should be in and two different judges have ruled in favor of both groups.  So now they have to wait on the courts to decide what to do because the state screwed everything up big time.  Its a complete mess. 

Imagine being a judge and you are ruling on a sports playoff structure.  Craziness.