Seven weeks into the prep football season, the CIF Sac-Joaquin Section Board of Managers voted overwhelmingly in favor of overhauling its postseason format.
On Wednesday, the board voted 55-2 to amend Bylaw 2207.8, cutting playoff brackets from 12 to eight teams and shortening the season by one week. While those eight teams in each division would move forward in a three-round bracket to compete for section championships, those seeded nine through 12, plus an additional four teams, will be matched up against one other for standalone, regional bowl games.
The section office confirmed Friday that league champions are guaranteed a spot in the eight-team brackets in their respective divisions. If there is a tie atop the conference standings at the end of the regular season, the berth goes to the winner of the head-to-head matchup.
As for the bowl games, teams must be ranked between No. 9 and No. 16 in their respective divisions by the MaxPreps.com computer rankings. Matchups will not be determined by the rankings, though, and instead will be set by the section’s seeding committee prioritizing regional matchups and competitiveness. Nevertheless, the committee will make efforts to avoid pairing teams from the same league in a bowl game. Additionally, bowl games may match teams from different divisions.
This new format is similar to the one used by the California Community College Athletic Association, with its top four NorCal teams on one side of the state bracket and the top four SoCal teams on the other, while teams that just missed the playoffs can participate in one of 12 bowl games. Still, the SJS is the first section in the state to introduce bowl games.
The changes are taking effect immediately.
For this first year of implementation, the quarterfinals of each bracket will begin on Nov. 14 — two weeks after the end of the regular season and giving the top eight teams a bye. Meanwhile, the 28 bowl games slated will in turn take place on Nov. 7, which is the week immediately after the conclusion of the regular season, a time that would typically feature first round games in the section’s former playoff format. Next year, though, bowl games and the first round of the playoff brackets will be played simultaneously the week after the regular season ends.
Assistant Commissioner Will DeBoard explained at SJS Media Day in August that the thinking behind bringing the format to the section was not only shortening the length of the tackle football season, which could amount to 17 weeks if counting scrimmages and a full postseason run, but to also avoid lopsided contests that have become common in the first round in recent years. In short: instead of getting blown out in the first round, teams can now end their year in a competitive game.
The proposal was developed by the section’s Football Advisory Committee in April of 2024 with the goal of implementing the changes for this season. Each member school was aware that the changes could be made in the middle of the football season, as what happened this week.
The committee consists of current football coaches and athletic directors from schools of all sizes from across the section.
There are 59 votes on the board of managers, though only 57 were cast Wednesday. Each of the section’s 25 leagues are represented by two votes, while the others were affiliated votes — from small and large schools representatives, as well as school board and superintendent reps, all elected by member schools.
The lone dissenting votes came from the Central California Conference, which represents Merced, Atwater, Los Banos, Golden Valley, Buhach Colony and El Capitan high schools.
The Central California Athletic League, which includes Turlock, Pitman, Downey, Modesto, Gregori and Enochs high schools, were represented by commissioner Ed Felt and president David Sanchez. The CCAL joined the other 23 leagues in voting in favor of the change, but not before proposing an amendment of their own.
Felt, a former Turlock High and Turlock Unified administrator, and Sanchez, the current principal of Downey High, suggested during the meeting that the playoff changes be put on hold until 2026, rather than be implemented with just four weeks to go in the current regular season. That idea didn’t gain much traction, and was quickly scrapped before the final vote took place.
Entering Friday’s games, here is how local programs landed in the MaxPreps rankings:
Turlock (1-0 CCAL, 2-4 overall) was ranked No. 11 among Division I teams in the section. Pitman (1-0 CCAL, 4-2 overall) were No. 12 in Division II. Hughson (2-1 Trans-Valley League, 6-1 overall) was the No. 4 team in Division IV. Hilmar (1-2 TVL, 4-3 overall) was ranked No. 2 in Division V. Denair (3-0 Southern League, 6-1 overall) was No. 4 in Division VII.
If this format was implemented last season, Turlock and Hughson would have remained in the playoff brackets of their respective divisions after each winning their conference and being ranked as top-eight teams. The Bulldogs (5-0 CCAL) were sixth in the D-I bracket while the Huskies (6-0 TVL) had the top seed in D-V.
Hilmar, although they finished sixth in the TVL last year at 2-4, also would have been unmoved as they were ranked sixth in the D-V bracket. The same would go for Denair, who finished fourth in the SL (3-3) and were ranked seventh in the D-7 bracket.
