West Shamokin

[Manfred]

A lot of your AA field this year will be AAA. May go back to the early 90's with a 1st round bye for the top to seeds and take 6. Personally I would like to see all games played at neutral sites but that's just me. There are a lot of stadiums that just aren't meant to hold a large crowd.

Regarding future playoff venues:  Half of the current LHAC has artificial turf.  BC no longer does, but FH will have theirs within the next yr. or 2.  In Nov. & Dec. you gotta have turf fields

[billmurray]

Have the updated enrollment figures been released yet?

no, schools had until Oct 15 to submit their enrollment numbers...Schools will hear back from the PIAA in mid-November about which class they fall in and then will have until mid-December to decide whether to play up a classification.

[Birda]

On a related note, does anybody know the issue with Farrell wanting to move back to WPIAL?

[billmurray]

[hr]

On a related note, does anybody know the issue with Farrell wanting to move back to WPIAL?

it's over, they've been refused...remain in D10..D7 left decision up to PIAA...

[Sykotyk]

Now is the time to abandon the District format, at least for football.  There will be roughly 96 teams per classification, so could be 4 regions of 24.  Use a points system to take the top 8 in each region and playoffs Weeks 11-15 (or 16 per region starting Week 10). The current District format is a mess, where strong bubble teams from some districts are left out while I saw a winless team in the bracket somewhere out east because of the disparity in district size.

Based on the link provided above, A would work out pretty nice with regions consisting of Central-5/6; West-7/8, North-4/9/10, and East-1/2/3/11/12.  If travel is an issue for larger regions (like the North and East in this example), you could always sub-bracket.  This is how Virginia does it for six classifications and two populous but distant populated areas, much like we have in PA, which results in most of your larger schools in two or three clusters, and several others scattered across the state.

An Ohio system would work. The problem is I'm torn. I live in Ohio now, and I see how it works.
I do love in PA, District 10 specifically, how the playoffs and regular season are handled. You always play local teams in the regular season. And then a small group for the first three rounds, including your local opponents. In Ohio, once you're in the playoffs, you could play a first round game against a team 150 miles away, depending on district and where the playoff teams are located.
In PA, you'd have to play neutral sites starting in Round 1.
Some complaints of the PA system (and particular districts): D7 has home-field in the first round. Some districts have home-field throughout. Some are all neutral. Many districts have so few teams, they must create subdistricts with other areas to form a small group of schools that almost always play eachother every year. You have a 6-team D8 and a 124 team D7.

You have D7 have all games on Friday, which includes games hosted at stadiums when their own schools are playing elsewhere at the same time. Stadium staff at North Allegheny, for instance, probably never get to see their Tigers in the playoffs after the first round because they're always hosting games. Splitting to Friday and Saturday would help. And help fans attend more than just one game a week.

Also, inter-district playoffs requiring a 'host district' is ridiculous. There can be many great venues halfway between two schools, but if it's not in the district, they can't. This includes D8, when hosting, always playing at Cupples Stadium because it's the district's only venue. Meanwhile, all those D7 venues that could be used as a good neutral site are lost.

Switching to a region setup (Ohio still has districts, but not for football), you could have more equality in the playoffs for all teams. No more super-small districts. No more 'always knowing where you're going to play/who you're going to play' because of certain districts hosting at certain sites.

[Birda]

[hr]

On a related note, does anybody know the issue with Farrell wanting to move back to WPIAL?

it's over, they've been refused...remain in D10..D7 left decision up to PIAA...

Yes, but why the request?

[Sykotyk]

[hr]

On a related note, does anybody know the issue with Farrell wanting to move back to WPIAL?

it's over, they've been refused...remain in D10..D7 left decision up to PIAA...

Yes, but why the request?

You have to understand Farrell. They're the smallest D10 school. They moved from D7 to D10 for financial considerations when fuel prices were high and the thought of playing West Middlesex, Sharpsville, Wilmington, Mercer, Reynolds, Lakeview, Kennedy Catholic, Sharon, Hickory, Greenville, etc were much more appealing than the far off schools they were playing in sports. Especially considering Neshannock is the closest D7 school, and Sharpsville, West Middlesex, Reynolds, Wilmington, and Mercer are all closer.
That decision to rejoin D10 was made by previous administrators who were looking at the bottom line. Now, the group in charge have rose-colored glasses back to the 'good ol' days' of their time in the WPIAL, not really factoring in fuel (it's cheap now, rather near-sighted), and think a return to D7 will mean a return to state title runs. This despite them making the second round last year, and one of the best teams in D10 1A this year.
Their reasoning is 'racism'. They felt that twice they were offended by someone in D10, and one of their coaches were accosted at a game.  Meanwhile, they claim since they never had this treatment in WPIAL, they want to go back. I think it's a false argument just to persuade the vote. But, it didn't work.

[billmurray]

sykotyk nailed it.

[tubmill]

 The Armstrong School Board approved West Shamokin High School's intent to leave the WPIAL and join the Heritage Conference in District 6. Approval must come from the WPIAL  The Heritage Conference, District 6 and the PIAA.

[Birda]

Lol at the parents crying about the level of competition, as if this isn't the same team that went 5 years without a win.

"But Bubba here ain't gonna get no scholarship offers from them big universities now."