WIAA FOOTBALL - New football playoff matrix being considered inWisconsin

WIAA FOOTBALL

Some big changes could be coming to the WIAA’s football playoff process and, apparently, these changes are widely supported by the state’s head coaches.

Called the Wisconsin Football Playoff Matrix, the proposal aims to provide a data-driven process that would not only determine the playoff fields in all seven divisions of 11-man football as well as eight-man football, the data would also determine seeds in each bracket and help create brackets that are geographically more travel friendly for the lower-seeded teams involved.

The matrix idea is modeled after one that is used in Ohio and was introduced by the Wisconsin Football Coaches Association in early December. Andy LaVoy and Jesse Norris of Madison Edgewood High School are credited with the development of the plan in collaboration with the WFCA.

According to Travis Wilson, general manager of WisSports.net, in a story he posted Dec. 19, 400 football head coaches had responded to a survey regarding the matrix proposal and 87.5% of them, 350, supported the proposed changes, while the other 50 preferred the current system of qualification, grouping and seeding.

Based on this support, Wilson reported the WFCA will recommend the WIAA Football Coaches Advisory Committee introduces the plan at its Jan. 7 meeting to start its push through the WIAA committee process. It could be approved by the WIAA Board of Control as early as Feb. 5 and could be ready to implement in the 2025 season.

The proposal includes four key features –– division placement, a ranking system within each division, playoff qualification and seeding and regions.

Division placement

Unlike the current system where divisional placement is determined once the 224-team field is set, teams would be assigned to their divisions under the matrix plan before the season begins. Those assignments would still be based on enrollment as well as the WIAA’s success factor. Teams playing 11-man football would be divided equally with any leftovers filling in from the top down.

Had the matrix been in place for 2024, when there were 364 11-man teams, there would have been exactly 52 teams in each of the seven divisions.

Playoff qualification

As has been the case since 1996, each division would have 32 teams. However, those 32 teams would be identified by the matrix’s ranking system. While winning games, of course, would be the key to making it in, conference records would no longer be the first factor in qualifying for the tournament as it is now. Currently a 43 conference record in most leagues is the first requirement to get in, though many 34 teams also get in.

Ranking system

The key feature in the matrix proposal is the two-tiered ranking system that aims to create a transparent and fair system in identifying playoff-worthy teams and their seeds in the tournament.

Teams would get Tier 1 points through their own wins. Wins over a Division 1 team would be worth 6.5 points, wins over a Division 2 team would be worth 6.0 points, wins over a Division 3 team would be worth 5.5 points and so on.

Tier 2 points are based on the success of a team’s defeated opponents and aim to reward quality wins. Tier 2 points are calculated as the total of defeated opponents’ Tier 1 points.

Tier 1 points are divided by the number of games played to get a Tier 1 score. Tier 2 points are divided by the number of opponents’ games played and multiplied by 10. Tier 1 and Tier 2 scores are then added to get a total score.

For example, using Medford’s 8-1 season in 2024 had the matrix been in place, the Raiders would’ve had 43 Tier 1 points based on five wins over Division 3 teams, a win over Division 2 Holmen, a win over Division 4 Mosinee and a win over Division 5 Tomahawk. Dividing 43 by nine games played gives Medford a Tier 1 score of 4.78.

The combined Tier 1 score of Medford’s eight defeated opponents was 195.5. Dividing that by 81 games played by all nine of Medford’s opponents and then multiplying by 10 gave the Raiders a Tier 2 score of 24.1. Adding the two tiers would’ve put Medford’s total score at 28.92, good for the fourth-best ranking in Division 3 and a number one seed, which it did get under the current system.

Seeds and regions

Seeding for the four eight-team brackets within each 32-team division would be done based on the ranking system. The top four ranked teams in each division would be one seeds, the four would be two seeds and so on.

The tricky part after that is putting teams in the appropriate geographical regions for their seeds.

Step one would be to assign each of the number-one seeds to one of four regions. For seeds two through four, who would host games in Level 1, they would be assigned to the region where the teams’ cumulative total drive time to each of the number-one seeds is minimized. Seeds four and three would be placed directly with their likely Level 2 opponent. Number-two seeds would be placed with the closest one seed, their likely Level 3 opponent, barring an upset.

For the traveling fifth through eighth seeds, minimal travel distance directly between Level 1 opponents would be prioritized.

As stated in the proposal, “We will prioritize minimizing total travel distance within each region while also considering the longest individual trip. During the calculations, we will track the longest trip assigned to any team within a region. If an alternative arrangement shortens the longest trip and the reduction in the longest trip exceeds the additional total distance incurred (without increasing total travel by more than 10%), we will select the option with the shorter longest trip. This ensures that travel burdens are more evenly distributed, preventing any single team from being disproportionately affected by the regional alignment.”

Higher seeds would host through the first three rounds, as they do under the currentWIAA system.

Not so sure

One of the 50 skeptics in the statewide survey was Medford’s head coach Ted Wilson, who just completed his 19th season in that position.

Wilson said his biggest issue was that in the hypothetical 2024 playoff field, had the matrix been in place, a handful of teams would have qualified in their divisions with fewer wins than non-qualifiers.

His main example was in Division 3 –– Medford’s division –– where 2-7 Wilmot was ranked 31st ahead of 32nd-ranked and 5-4 Cudahy, because it upset 6-3 Burlington, a Division team in week nine. Rhinelander (3-6), Pewaukee (4-5), New Berlin Eisenhower (3-6) and Milwaukee Pius XI Catholic (4-5) would’ve been the top four teams left out of the Division 3 tournament.

“If you look at almost every division at the very bottom, you’ll see the same thing,” Wilson said. “A 3-6 team gets in over a 4-5 team or a 5-4 team because they upset somebody in one week so they get a huge boost in their Tier 2 points.

I don’t know if that makes that team more eligible or not. That’s the one hang up I have.

“It hasn’t been lately, knock on wood, and hopefully it won’t be, but we’ve been in those situations where you’re struggling to win games and you just win enough to get in,” he added. “It’d really be tough to win five games and then have somebody with two wins get in over you.”

Wilson felt the new plan also minimizes the importance of conference play and where, theoretically, now the best 224 teams in the state get into the tournament, pre-determining divisions and then trying to identify the top 32 in those divisions won’t necessarily mean the best 224 are getting in.

“I’m kind of an old school guy, I still think conferences should mean something,” he said. “It’s still going to do the same thing. If they change it and more people are happy, that’s great. It’s not going to bother me because I still know we need to win. Every week is an important game. That’s not going to change around here as long as I’m here. We’re going to strive to win every game.”

Gilman head coach Robin Rosemeyer said the plan could have a very minimal effect on the eight-player side of things. First, there are no divisions in eight-man football, taking away the Tier 1 aspect. Secondly, the key tiebreaker in qualifying for the eight-man tournament already is winning percentage of opponents beaten.

The WIAA’s 16-team eight-player bracket is filled on best overall winning percentage. Gilman, at 6-2 this year, lost out on a playoff spot in the opponents’ winning percentage tie-breaking process.

The bigger push among the eightplayer teams is an expansion of the playoff field from 16 to 32, which Rosemeyer said that it is his understanding will be part of the final proposal. Had the field been 32 teams this year, Gilman and Rib Lake would’ve easily been in the tournament. Using the matrix, Gilman would’ve been a five-seed and Rib Lake would’ve been a six-seed.