Friday, October 7, 2011

PIAA takes step to shorten football season

The PIAA passed a second reading Thursday night to shorten the high school football season from 16 weeks to 15 weeks.

Under the current schedule, the PIAA football championships take place the week before Christmas. Most states end their football season earlier, and those that don't are in warm-weather climates.

Except for Pennsylvania.

Under the new rules, PIAA districts will have the option of dropping the second scrimmage or keeping two scrimmages. Most coaches I spoke with before the season were in favor of keeping two scrimmages.

The WPIAL champion will enter the PIAA playoffs in the semifinals. The current format has the champions entering the quarterfinals.

With the way things are structured, it appears the WPIAL will keep its four-week playoff schedule. Considering the football playoffs are the main money maker for the WPIAL, that is welcome news.

1 comment:

Joey Niklas said...

I still think the playoff field should be cut even further statewide. The season should start a week earlier, Florida, Ohio and other states start a week or 2 before PA. And PA should go to a 9 week schedule statewide. This alone ends the season late November/early December.