State is too big for true champ, but bowls need to be tweaked

It’s put up or shut up time for us sportswriters who complain that the inaugural California Interscholastic Federation State Football Championship Bowl Games are a farce and will settle nothing after the tripleheader Saturday at the Home Depot Center in Carson.

My boss told me to come up with an idea for a state championship that would work. It has been 79 years since California last held a state championship in football. The CIF insists this bowl format is the best it can do, even though it doesn’t match No. 1 vs. No. 2 because enrollment figures helped to determine game participants.

California and New Jersey are the last states not to hold state championships in high school football.

Here’s the dilemma California has faced: It’s the second-largest state behind Texas in terms of teams participating in 11-man football, with 1,015 schools fielding teams. Each of the CIF’s 10 geographical sections is diverse and autonomous, and getting them to agree on something requires all sorts of compromise.

I’ve looked over the state championship models used in Texas, Pennsylvania and Ohio and have concluded that California is simply too big to hold statewide playoffs in football.

In addition, the cost would be too prohibitive and doing away with section playoffs would have far-reaching effects. Football gate receipts are critical for funding extracurricular activities, so sections won’t agree to dilute their own playoffs.

Texas has a 16-week season, which includes six weeks of state playoffs with teams divided by school enrollment. It crowns 12 champions. Pennsylvania has six weeks of playoffs and crowns regional and state champions. Ohio sends teams into the five rounds of playoffs based entirely on computer power ratings and has six championship games played over two days.

California’s new bowl format is a two-year pilot program in which the football season is extended to a 15th week. Adding a 16th week that would come just before Christmas would be rejected by the sections because it would interfere too much with academic schedules and be another blow to the dwindling number of multiple-sport athletes who want to move from football to soccer, basketball or wrestling.

Starting the season earlier wouldn’t work either because school districts begin their years at different times.

So while I am in agreement with the CIF that the only way to hold state championships in football in California is by using a bowl-game format, I’m prepared to add flexibility to the process of selecting the participating teams.

The CIF has been intent on making its football playoffs similar to its basketball and girls’ volleyball state playoffs, separating participants into divisions based on enrollment and then matching the best teams from Southern California against the best from Northern California.

It doesn’t have to be that way.

Just look at the CIF track and field championship. There’s no separation into divisions. The top qualifiers from each section compete, regardless of school enrollment or where they live.

“When somebody is state champion in track, they are a true state champion,” Lake Balboa Birmingham track Coach Scott King said. “That’s what makes our state championship the best in the nation.”

If I were in charge, I’d gather the 10 section commissioners in a room and tell them to pick the two strongest football teams, regardless of enrollment or location, and match them in a Division I-A bowl game.

The guidelines for selections would be won-loss record, strength of schedule, head-to-head competition and state and national rankings. The teams would also have to be section champions.

Then I would have them select the next two best teams, using the same criteria, for the Division I-AA bowl game.

A third bowl game would be limited to the two best teams with enrollments under 1,000, regardless of location.

This would give California a credible state championship in football, create fan interest and not take away from the importance of individual section titles.

The ideal model would be to extend the season one more week, seeding the top four teams and allowing the winners to meet in a final game, but I’m just not willing to extend the season to a 16th week. It’s just too much to ask of players, coaches and parents, many of whom would be involved in their seventh month of nonstop football.

“I coached 14 games five years in a row,” Mission Viejo Coach Bob Johnson said. “It’s awesome but it’s tiring and you’re ready for Christmas. It’s time to take the helmets off for a while.”

Based on my guidelines, Saturday’s bowl matchups would look like this: Westlake Village Oaks Christian (14-0) vs. Concord De La Salle (13-0) in Division I-A, Orange Lutheran (13-1) vs. Sacramento Grant (13-0) in Division I-AA and Modesto Central Catholic (12-1) vs. Santa Rosa Cardinal Newman (13-1) in Small Schools.

Instead, we have Canyon Country Canyon (11-2) vs. De La Salle in Division I, Orange Lutheran vs. Palo Alto (12-1) in Division II and Oaks Christian vs. Cardinal Newman in Division III.

Under the current format, the tripleheader Saturday features virtual exhibitions that will settle nothing. Why play a 15th week of the season unless a real state championship is at stake?

Eric Sondheimer can be reached at [email protected].

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Deciding a champion

California is one of only two states that doesn’t have a tournament to crown football champions. A look at how other states handle playoffs:

TEXAS

* 1,018 schools play 11-man football with a playoff structure that culminates in 10 state championships. Schools are divided by enrollment into five classifications, with two divisions within each.

* 485 (48%) qualify for playoffs.

* Maximum number of regular-season games is 10, with five (32-team bracket) or six rounds (64-team bracket) of playoffs to determine a champion, often the week before Christmas.

FLORIDA

* 468 schools play 11-man football, with champions crowned in eight enrollment-based divisions. Top two teams in each district (or league) advance to playoffs.

* 192 (41%) qualify for playoffs.

* Maximum number of regular-season games is 10, with four to five rounds of playoffs depending on division.

OHIO

* 715 schools play 11-man football, divided into six classes, with each class separated into four geographical regions. Qualifying is based on computer power-rating system, which puts a premium on strength of schedule.

* 192 (27%) qualify for playoffs.

* Maximum number of regular-season games is 10, with five rounds of playoffs.

PENNSYLVANIA

* 595 schools play 11-man football, divided into 12 regions with four champions. Some regions use a power-rating system and others league finish to determine qualifiers.

* 271 (46%) qualify for playoffs.

* Maximum number of regular-season games is 10, with five to seven rounds of playoffs depending on region and class.

Researched by Eric Maddy