California High School Football

[Cap Ologist]

Anybody know how California high schools are divided into districts/divisions for football? Is it by region or enrollment?

[Chief Rum]

Region, technically. Leagues are grouped into the same divisions (regardless of enrollment), although the leagues as a whole might be grouped by enrollment (not sure how they came to determine the different divisions; I just know every team in a league is in the same division).

This is different than CA basketball, which is grouped by enrollemnt (at least for playoff purposes).

CR

[MrBug708]

I dont think that is accurate Chief, but I'm not totally sure about that. Divisions are set by enrollment but you are allowed to move up if you want, but it is difficult. Leagues aren't as important though as the Division is. On top of that, you can't win State for football because that would take more then a year, but you win CIF, which is close to the same thing, but there are 15 or so regions of CIF in California.

[Cap Ologist]

Would this be an accurate website to get info?

hxxp://www.cifstate.org/CIF%20Sections/sections.htm

[Glengoyne]

Originally Posted by MrBug708

I dont think that is accurate Chief, but I'm not totally sure about that. Divisions are set by enrollment but you are allowed to move up if you want, but it is difficult. Leagues aren't as important though as the Division is. On top of that, you can't win State for football because that would take more then a year, but you win CIF, which is close to the same thing, but there are 15 or so regions of CIF in California.

That is pretty well how I would describe it. Not sure about the 15 regions part, but that probably isn't too far off.

[rexallllsc]

I think it's 12 divisions and 4 regions.

[MrBug708]

LA alone has 2. City and Southern

[Chief Rum]

Originally Posted by MrBug708

I dont think that is accurate Chief, but I'm not totally sure about that. Divisions are set by enrollment but you are allowed to move up if you want, but it is difficult. Leagues aren't as important though as the Division is. On top of that, you can't win State for football because that would take more then a year, but you win CIF, which is close to the same thing, but there are 15 or so regions of CIF in California.

Well, technically, I did say that enrollment was a factor, but it is based on a league-wide basis (which is derived regionally, outside of parochial & private schools). The divisions are enrollment based, but a school's membership in a division is based on the enrollment of its league as a whole, not on that of individual schools.

I normally don't know crap about this stuff, but it just so happens this exact topic is in the OC Register today, so if it's wrong, take it up with their sports editor.

CR

[judicial clerk]

I used to know this stuff and I will take a crack at it:

Schools are broken up into divisions based on enrollment. These divisions are analogous to NCAA Division I, IAA, II, III. For playoff purposes, all schools in the state in the same division compete against each other to determine state championships. This is a general rule with some exceptions. One exception is that a school can choose to compete in a higher division than its enrolment would dictate. This happens sometimes with private schools who have a Division III enrollment, but have Division I talent on their sports teams. My understanding is that these shcools can pick and choose which sports they want to compete at a higher division.

The state is also broken up geographically into the Sections referenced on the webpage cited above. Generally, a section contains many leagues and the various league champs and other playoff qualifiers would compete against other league champs and playoff qualifiers from the same section in a tournament to determine a section champion. Each Section has a tournament for each division to crown a champ at Div. I, Div II, Div III, etc. Some sections are also broken down into multiple "Sub-Sections" which will have their own tournaments similar to the section tournament. In basketball, for example, the various section champions and 6 at large teams would then play in the state tournament. This tournament is split north and south so the championship game would always be a school from norther/central california against a school from southern california. However, in Football, no games are played beyond the section championship games because of concerns that the season would otherwise drag on too long, interfere with other seasons and academics, and would be hard on school boy athletes. Now Cap, I notice that you are from Texas, so that last sentence probably does not make any sense to you. The problem is that most of these Sections contain more schools than a majority of states. However, I understand that the CIF (the california high school sports governing body) is considering having a state tournament for football. Currently, there is no state football championship awarded by the CIF, but there are various polls that pick a champ.

In the past, the CIF has been flexible regarding these rules to accomodate specific logistic and community issues. For example, some sections that do not have enough leagues in a particular division to field a meaningful playoff tournament, may decide to award a playoff spot to the best non-playoff team from a higher division within that section.

[DanGarion]

Originally Posted by judicial clerk

I used to know this stuff and I will take a crack at it:

Schools are broken up into divisions based on enrollment. These divisions are analogous to NCAA Division I, IAA, II, III. For playoff purposes, all schools in the state in the same division compete against each other to determine state championships. This is a general rule with some exceptions. One exception is that a school can choose to compete in a higher division than its enrolment would dictate. This happens sometimes with private schools who have a Division III enrollment, but have Division I talent on their sports teams. My understanding is that these shcools can pick and choose which sports they want to compete at a higher division.

The state is also broken up geographically into the Sections referenced on the webpage cited above. Generally, a section contains many leagues and the various league champs and other playoff qualifiers would compete against other league champs and playoff qualifiers from the same section in a tournament to determine a section champion. Each Section has a tournament for each division to crown a champ at Div. I, Div II, Div III, etc. Some sections are also broken down into multiple "Sub-Sections" which will have their own tournaments similar to the section tournament. In basketball, for example, the various section champions and 6 at large teams would then play in the state tournament. This tournament is split north and south so the championship game would always be a school from norther/central california against a school from southern california. However, in Football, no games are played beyond the section championship games because of concerns that the season would otherwise drag on too long, interfere with other seasons and academics, and would be hard on school boy athletes. Now Cap, I notice that you are from Texas, so that last sentence probably does not make any sense to you. The problem is that most of these Sections contain more schools than a majority of states. However, I understand that the CIF (the california high school sports governing body) is considering having a state tournament for football. Currently, there is no state football championship awarded by the CIF, but there are various polls that pick a champ.

In the past, the CIF has been flexible regarding these rules to accomodate specific logistic and community issues. For example, some sections that do not have enough leagues in a particular division to field a meaningful playoff tournament, may decide to award a playoff spot to the best non-playoff team from a higher division within that section.

That sounds pretty accurate. I used to be the TA for my HS Athletic Director and that's about how I remember it.

[Cap Ologist]

Thanks for the explanations.