HS Football Rule Changes for 2017

The National Federation of State High Schools (NFHS) continues to tweak its rules governing high school football, this year focusing on protection of defenseless players.  Below is a summary of these changes:

• A defender will no longer be permitted to punish a receiver in an attempt to jar the ball loose while the receiver is in the act of catching it. In addition, this type of contact must be withheld until the receiver completes the catch and turns himself into a runner.  Prior to this, the defender can use only open hands.

• A defender can use only open hands against a quarterback who is in the act of throwing the ball or just after releasing the ball.

• No contact is permitted against a runner whose forward progress has been stopped by other players or who is in the act of sliding feet first.

• No contact is permitted against a player who is considered to be out of the play.

• Only open hands can be used against the receiver of a punt or kickoff until he turns himself into a runner.

• Blindside blocks can only be administered using open hands.

• The pop-up onside kick has been eliminated in order to protect defenseless receiving players.

Other rule changes include:

• Face guarding by a pass defender is now permitted provided he does not make physical contact with the receiver.

• A defender is not permitted to contact a center’s arm or the ball until the ball has been released from the center’s hand.

• During the last two minutes of either half, an offended team can opt to have the clock restarted on the snap rather than immediately after the penalty has been enforced.

• Home jerseys must be dark in color and contrasting to white. This may ultimately eliminate those light gray uniforms.

Competitive Balance Observations

Starting with the 2017 season, the OHSAA will begin assigning each school to a football playoff division using both its current enrollment and an adder that takes into account the number of roster players that arrived at the school via the transfer route.  Termed “Competitive Balance (CB),” the goal is to “level the playing field,” particularly with the parochial schools, who are perceived to have an advantage over public schools in drawing area when it comes to securing players. The idea is that moving certain parochial schools up a division will level the field within each division.

Ohio’s football playoff system has been in place since 1972.  Throughout its 45 years of existence, the parochial schools have claimed a sizeable number of state championships when compared to public schools, in spite of comprising just 18% of the total school count.  In recent years, parochial schools have dominated the playoffs in the upper divisions, capturing 9 of the last 10 titles in D1, 4 of the last 5 in D2, the last 8 in D3 and the last 3 in D4.  In 2016, the state title went to a public school only in Division 6.  This history of imbalance has caused the ire of many public school administrators and led to a 2012 proposal to conduct separate playoffs for public and parochial schools.

Although a majority of school superintendents approved a referendum to place the proposal on the ballot, the OHSAA intervened fearing that if passed the parochial schools would leave the OHSAA.  Thus they engineered a compromise that changed the proposal to an “adder” system.  In 2014, the proposal was approved and it is scheduled for implementation starting with the current season.

In essence, if a student from outside the school district enrolls in a public high school, two points are added to the school’s enrollment.  If the student had originally enrolled in the school system in the seventh or eighth grade, one point is added.  For parochial schools, if a student from a public school enrolls in the high school, two points are added.  If a student from a parochial elementary school enrolls in the high school, one point is added.  An exception is that a parochial high school may identify a home elementary school and no points are added for any enrollees from that school.  The adder can have the effect of moving a school up a single division, but not two.

Here are some observations as CB takes affect:

• For Division 1, splitting the playoffs would have produced a more competitive environment among the public schools. However, CB will only create the potential for adding yet more parochial schools to the division and make it that much harder for the public schools to compete.  It’s only a coincidence that no parochial schools were added this year.

• Several schools moved up or down throughout the various divisions, mostly due to changes in base enrollment. However, many parochial schools moved up a division due to the effects of the CB adder.  This was likely the intent of the change.

• As expected, the highest CB adders belong to the parochial schools. Top among the group is Lakewood St. Edward, with an adder of 381.  In terms of percent change in enrollment, the highest is Toledo Central Catholic (TCC), with an adder of 94%.  Interestingly, the change in base enrollment would have dropped TCC from D3 to D4.  However, the adder was sufficient enough to move them up two divisions to D2.  But per the rules schools can move up only one division.  Thus TCC finds itself back in D3.  Avid football fans will note that TCC annually dominates its conference, which is comprised primarily of D1 and D2 teams.

• While D1 remains effectively unchanged, D2 got stronger with the addition of Cleveland Benedictine, Akron Hoban, Mentor Lake Catholic and Dayton Carroll, which join holdovers Cincinnati LaSalle, Toledo St. Francis, Toledo St. John’s, Walsh Jesuit and Columbus St. Charles.

• The only large public school to move up a division due to CB was Tiffin Columbian. Tiffin advanced from D3 to D2 on account of a CB adder of 88.  Massillon Perry moved up to D1, but this is due only to an increase in base enrollment, not their CB adder of 21.

• Traditional large public school powers Mentor, Toledo Whitmer, Hilliard Davidson, Huber Heights and Cincinnati Colerain do not have open enrollment. Thus, their adders are in the single digits.  Of course, they’re D1 anyway.

• Massillon is the 32^nd largest school in D2 (104^th largest school the state) with an enrollment of 500. With the CB adder, Massillon climbs to the 18^th position in D2 (90^th in the state), with an adjusted enrollment of 538 or an increase of 8% (7^th largest increase among public schools in D2; 189^th largest increase among all schools in the state).

• It takes an adjusted enrollment of 618 to qualify for D1. Therefore, with a current adjusted enrollment of 538, it does not appear likely that Massillon will return to D1 anytime soon.

• The OHSAA may need to modify its CB formula in a couple of years after they find little change in the playoff results. Either that or administrators may once again push to split the playoffs.

Massillon Remains in Region 7 for 2017 OHSAA Playoffs

The Ohio High School Athletic Association has released its regional assignments for the 2017 football playoffs and Massillon once again finds itself in Region 7, along with several Columbus-area schools.  However, some modifications have been made to the list owing to the incorporation of “competitive balance,” with five schools from last year moving out and five new schools moving in.

Those vacating Region 7 and moving up to Division 1 include Groveport, Delaware and Perry, last year’s Division 2 state runner-up.  Mansfield and Tri-Valley have been reassigned to Division 3.  Newcomers to Region 7 from Division 1 include North Canton and Westerville South.  Moving up from Division 3 are Ashland, Columbus Whetstone and Columbus Whitehall.

The new divisional assignments were the result of (1) basic changes to school enrollment for the coming year, and (2) adjustments to school enrollment as part of the new competitive balance strategy.  The goal of competitive balance is to “level the playing field” by moving schools up a division when they enjoy a high number of transfer students that participate in the given sport.  The method was particularly directed at parochial schools.  However, none of last year’s Division 2 parochial schools moved up to Division 1, whereas several parochial schools shifted from Division 3 to Division 2, including Cleveland Benedictine, Mentor Lake Catholic and defending Division 3 state champion Akron Hoban, all of which are in a loaded Region 5.

Once again there are 27 teams in Region 7.  Eight of these will qualify for the playoffs once the season has ended.  So who should fans keep an eye on?  If the current regional assignments had been in place for the last ten years, one can determine those teams from Region 7 that would be considered contenders.  These include the following, based on the number of times (in brackets) they would have qualified over this time period:

(8) Massillon
(6) Ashland, Canal Winchester
(5) Lake, Wooster, Westerville South, New Albany, Licking Heights, Big Walnut
(4) North Canton, Boardman, Dublin Scioto, Worthington Kilbourne, Logan

Of course, knowledgeable fans would look to Massillon, Westerville South, Dublin Scioto and Worthington Kilbourne as the favorites to advance, with Lake, North Canton and Boardman as the dark horses..

For a complete list of the teams in Region 7, click Here.

Football, Illinois Style

Ever wonder how other states conduct their high school football playoffs?  One worth looking at is Illinois.  There are no divisions in the Illinois High School Association (IHSA) system, yet they end up with eight state champions at the end of the day.  Here’s how they do it.

Approximately 580 schools play football in Illinois.  Take away the 42 teams that compete in the Chicago Public League (they don’t participate in the playoffs) and that leaves around 538 that are eligible for the playoffs.  Of that, a whopping 256 qualify, or 48% of the total.  Contrast that with Ohio, which has 749 teams playing football.  Of that group, 224 or just 30% participate in the playoffs.

Unlike Ohio, Illinois does not select their qualifiers using a computer.  Instead, they follow this hierarchy:

1. Champions of conferences with six or more teams.
2. Most regular season victories.
3. Combined wins of all opponents (strength of schedule)
4. Combined wins of all defeated opponents.

In most years, all teams with at least six wins will qualify and most of those with five will also (after tie-breakers are used).  It should be noted, however, that Illinois teams play 9-game schedules.

Once the 256 teams are selected, they are ordered from the largest enrollment to the smallest regardless of record.  Then eight brackets of 32 teams each are created, starting with the largest 32 and working toward the bottom.  Each bracket is divided into two halves of 16 teams each, based on location.  Finally, the teams within each half are seeded using the same qualification hierarchy as shown above.

In a curious twist, the total school enrollment is used, so the number of girls is factored in as well.  In rare cases, the enrollment is increased by 1.65.  The IHSA calls this the “Success Adjustment.”  Only two teams were affected last year.

What if the Illinois method was used in the Buckeye state?  Staying with seven brackets and based on 224 teams qualifying, a team would need an 8-2 record to guarantee a spot.  Around 80% of those finishing 7-3 would qualify.  But 14 teams that were in the playoffs last year with records of 6-4 and below would be booted, including ironically Cincinnati St. Xavier, Ohio’s playoff state champion.  Others left behind include Canton McKinley, GlenOak, Lancaster, Cincinnati Elder, Lake and Akron St. Vincent-St. Mary.  Also, 20% of the teams with 7-3 records would fail to qualify, depending on the “strength of schedule” tie breaker.

Interestingly, Divisions 1 and 2 would qualify just 10% and 13% of their teams, respectively, while the majority of the playoff teams would come from Divisions 5 through 7.  While Division 1 would advance around 23 teams, the remaining seven for the top bracket would come from Division 2, pulling in Perry and Warren Harding.  Although Massillon would be an automatic qualifier based on its 8-2 record, the enrollment level would place it in the second division.

Could the Illinois playoff system work in Ohio?  Probably, to an extent.  The winners of conferences receive automatic bids regardless of record, so that is probably a good thing.  The remaining conference teams would need to finish well and take care of those early non-conference games, not dissimilar to the current system.  However, for the independent schools, there is no extra credit for playing tough schedules (except for 7-3 record tie breakers).  These teams would need to select opponents wisely and mostly avoid playing the tougher schools for fear that an 8-2 record might not so easily be achieved.  Case in point: Cincinnati St. Xavier and its 5-5 mark.  And then there is the new OHSAA Competitive Advantage format.  It’s possible that this experiment might meet with greater success using the Illinois system, provided an effective multiplier is applied to the schools affected the most.  At least it might be accepted better by the masses.  As expected, there would be pros and cons.