On Aug. 19, the MIAA (Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association) voted 12-2 in favor of the Super 8 rule that will change high school football for many years to come.
The rule will restructure the current playoff format for the 2027 season. It will still consist of nine divisions, but instead of the Top 16 making the postseason from each division, only the Top 8 will make it from now on. The decisionmakers believe that there were many issues with the current format, and this new rule will maximize the relevance of the regular season.
The MIAA wanted to align each division evenly, forcing each one to have a minimum of 30 teams. This change will result in cutting the number of playoff teams from Division 3 to Division 8 roughly in half.
The state’s governing board for high school sports was also looking to find a way to reduce the frequency of uneven games, particularly for seeds 9-16, which historically have a lower winning percentage. The total number of wins for those seeds has been 52, with seeds 12-16 making up just nine of those. The total number of wins for seeds 1-8 added up to 546.
The committee was also taking into account the number of times that Division 1 and 2 clubs have appeared in the finals, hoping that it will give more teams a chance to compete for a championship. The Xaverian Hawks, for example, have won the last three Division 1 state crowns. They were also looking to reduce the number of consolation games and the number of teams opting out after being eliminated from postseason competition.
These proposed changes will drastically impact the regular season, as well. Starting this season, every regular season game will contribute to a team’s power ranking, which are used to formulate the postseason matchups, and as a result teams will play nine games, instead of eight.
There won’t be a minimum number of games to automatically qualify for the playoffs. A team could go 7-2, and may not qualify for the tournament, because of the strength of its schedule.
Division 1A will also be introduced in 2027, which will be considered a top-tier bracket featuring Division 1 and 2 teams. These two divisions will also include eight teams, which will be identified by the power rankings after Week 9.
The top eight teams in each division from one to eight, including the Division 1A teams, will qualify for the postseason. In summation, there will be 72 postseason teams over nine divisions.
With the regular season now stretching over nine weeks, Week 10 is planned to be the first round of the playoffs and consolation games. Week 11 will be the state semifinal rounds. Week 12 will be the traditional Thanksgiving Day game. The MIAA believes that these games are important to most communities, and decided to keep them, despite the schedule changes. Finally, Week 13 will feature the nine Super Bowl games.
How will this affect the Marblehead High football program? Head Coach Jim Rudloff breaks everything down as clearly as possible, while also blaming the traditional Thanksgiving Day games for the playoff dilemma.
“We (have) to extend the season by one week to accommodate the semifinal and final games (and one more regular season game),” he said. “This is a massive sticking point with the MIAA.”
Fall practices for all sports started on the same day this year, which was on Monday, Aug. 24, but Rudloff finds that rather ironic. “Oddly enough, when you think about it, the spring sports season has never started on time, because of the field conditions. So why are we pushing (fall sports) back one week? Maybe we can start baseball on a real field, and not in a gym (with a later start date).”
The football Magicians nine regular season games are as follows: Lynn English at Piper on Thursday, Sept. 10, at 7 p.m.; Medway at Piper on Friday, Sept. 18, at 6:30 p.m.; at Scituate on Friday, Sept. 25, at 7 p.m.; at Danvers on Friday, Oct. 2, at 6:30 p.m.; St. Mary’s at Lynn’s Manning Field on Friday, Oct. 9, at 5 p.m.; Beverly at Piper on Friday, Oct. 16, at 7 p.m.; Peabody at Piper on Friday, Oct. 23, at 7 p.m.; Masconomet at Piper on Friday, Oct. 30, at 7 p.m.; and at Swampscott on Thursday, Nov. 26, at 10 a.m.
