I'm with westsider on this one. 6 classes and 4 teams in each district has really watered it down. It was ok when there were 6 and 7 teams in each district in the 4 class system. personally, I think the state championship should be played thanksgiving weekend, too. Would seem to me more folks could make it to the game on that weekend, being a holiday, then they could the 1st wkend in Dec. So, i'd kinda like i if they went with 2 teams in each district or cut out the bye week, so, it could get over a week earlier. And, then there is always inclement weather possibilities, the later it's played...

Then why is it OK for every other athlete in every other sport in the state to automatically be in the playoffs? Yes, you will have a lot of lopsided scores but you might have a few 4 seeds win and one may even make a state final. Just ask Simon Kenton. I am sure there are some first round matchups in district play in basketball that are lopsidied as well, but they still play or some cross country runners who have no chance in their regional meet but they still get to run. Are there too many classes in football? Yes. Does it hurt anyone to have more teams in the playoffs? No

 

In football all of the teams go into a single tounrament for each class so it is one playoff. In the other sports you have a district/regional tounrament for most of them so not all of the teams are going into the playoffs - thier district/region determines who represents them in a different way.

 

I do agree there are to many classes - we need to reduce those numbers and then have 8 conferences/district per class with two teams representing each conference/district. Don't seed the tournament by location, seed all district champions and then seed/place runners-up on hte opposite side of the bracket.

The issue for me is not the 1vs4 seeding. The issue is the travel. Example E-town to Bell Co. is crazy for a first round game. Makes no sense to me how Bell Co. ended up in the west.

 

I know that many would not agree, but I don't think travel should be considered in the playoffs. take two from each, seed the champions and place the runner-up on the other side of the bracket. let them meet in the finals if they are both good enough for it. Don't worry abnout traveling. The couple of years I spent in AZ, we had to travel a minimum of 2 hours for all of our ditrict games because we were so isolated from everyone else (and ourt closest non-district school was still 1 1/2 hours away).

 

This also takes care of the alignment issue in the playoffs.