OPINION: The system is broken; how can it be fixed?

In this first year of the Arizona Interscholastic Association (AIA) using the power rankings from MaxPreps to rank and seed football teams, the vitriol seems to have been more than it was in previous years when the AIA used its own computer formula to complete the process.  In the early part of the season, it was the use of preseason rankings, which went away after four weeks, but the strength of schedule component seems to be more skewed than it was before.  Then it was the mysterious changes that took place between Sunday’s update and Thursday when no games were played.

On Saturday, the playoff fields were announced for the 3A, 4A, and 5A conferences.  The 2A and 1A are already in their playoffs and the 6A and Open will complete their regular seasons this week.  Now, no matter what system you use, people will always be upset.  We’ll see that this March even though the NCAA Basketball tournament has expanded to 76 teams (which was a terrible idea).  Someone will always feel left out.

This season’s power rankings have created confusion throughout the season.  Teams win, but move down.  Teams sometimes find themselves behind others where there are common opponents, and things didn’t stack up the way people expected it would.  Head-to-head is non-existent.  There is a 2-8 team in the 3A playoffs(!)  There is an 8-2 team that didn’t make the 4A playoffs.  Worst of all, there is no explanation for it because the MaxPreps formula isn’t a simple one that coaches (or anyone else) can understand.  They feel a lack of transparency.

But something almost happened this year that can best be described as a Doomsday scenario.  Let’s take a look at the following case:

The 2026 Tempe Buffaloes

Tempe struggled mightily at the start of this decade (0-15 in 2020-21), which caused a move down from 4A to 3A.  The Buffaloes went 1-9 at that level in 2022 under new head coach Sean Freeman, but then they improved.  After back-to-back seasons at .500, Tempe petitioned to move back up to 4A.  The school was placed in a region and given a schedule for the new two-year block for 2025-26.

Following a 6-4 season in 2025, the Buffaloes continued to get better.  They opened the year with a 59-7 win over Alhambra and stood at 8-1 heading into last Thursday’s season finale at home against Marcos de Niza.  In a back-and-forth game, Tempe High trailed by six and had a first-and-goal at the 5.  The Padres stood tall and kept Tempe out of the end zone with just over four minutes to go.  There was no more scoring and Marcos won by a 36-30 score.

The interesting thing was when the final power rankings were released on Saturday.  There are 24 playoff spots available in the 58-school 4A Conference.  Here’s how the final spots played out:

24. Pueblo (7-3) 40.8427

28. Tempe (8-2) 33.0435

Now, I’m not going to debate whether the Buffaloes should or should not have been in this year’s playoff field.  What hurt them was that their eight wins came against teams that went 16-63.  Peeling back the layers, sets off some alarms, for the future of this formula though.

In looking at the point differential (7.8 points) between Tempe and the coveted #24, I can say with probably an 80% certainty that had Tempe won Thursday’s game, it probably still would have fallen short.  This is based on how many points teams lose or gain by Week 10 (when the new game represents only 10% of your schedule).  For example, St. Mary’s won its final game (over ALA-West Foothills) and went up by 1.7.  The difference between losing and winning that final game over Marcos de Niza likely wasn’t going to move the needle almost 8 points.

Taking it a step further, we go back to Week 2, when Tempe was scheduled to play Carl Hayden.  The Falcons didn’t have enough healthy players to field a team and had to cancel.  This was the only cancellation all year for CHHS, which finished 0-9.  That same week, Saguaro canceled on Chaparral leaving the 5A Firebirds available to play.  Tempe willingly took on the game and it was quickly scheduled for that Friday.  Chaparral won the game (57-0).  MaxPreps uses the statewide rankings (nationally, actually) and in comparison to a 4A team, Chaparral is ranked just ahead of Prescott (who is #3 in the 4A rankings).  This was part of what Tempe was trying to accomplish by playing CHS, improving the schedule, as well as letting their kids play.

The what-ifs here are, what if Tempe had just taken the forfeit (which is not counted in the points) win?  The loss to Chaparral wouldn’t have factored into the formula, but the benefit of playing such a high team wouldn’t be either.  The AIA formula used to emphasize undefeated teams, but the MaxPreps one doesn’t.  Case in point is in the 5A, where ALA-Gilbert North (10-0) is ranked #4 behind Notre Dame Prep (7-2).  Notre Dame’s losses were Desert Edge and Cactus Shadows.  ALAGN beat both of those teams.  So, I don’t think a 10-0 Tempe team (9-0 in the power rankings) would have made the playoff field either.  What if Carl Hayden didn’t have to forfeit?  Well, that probably wouldn’t have helped Tempe much at all because the Falcons ended up being ranked #58 and that schedule would have been added to their SOS.

The headline in this article is a bold one, but through the above proofs, I think we can deduce that it is very likely had it not been for a goal-line stand and a canceled game (by either Carl Hayden OR Saguaro), we would have had a 10-0 team miss the playoffs.  And for that reason. . .

The system is broken

And that simply cannot happen.  You can’t have a team (any team) work 12 months a year going from winter strength and conditioning to speed training, then four weeks of spring ball, followed by a month of 7-on-7’s, a four-week training camp in the heat of August, leading up to kickoff of Game 1, when it’s 103 degrees, to have NO shot at making the playoffs before the game clock even starts!

Now, I can’t use this space simply to complain about the existing system without coming up with an alternative.

The worst thing about the existing system is teams getting what we’ll call bus bonuses by getting on a yellow school bus, riding 30 miles (or more), getting pounded by 40 (to a really good team), and being rewarded for it.  Don’t believe me, check out Salpointe in the 6A.  The Lancers (3-6) have played Chandler, Perry, and Basha, lost those games by a combined score of 112-10, but find themselves just on the good side of the ledger (top 20 make playoffs) three places above a team that is 6-3.

In coming up with a new format, the first thing I want it to do is reward winning.  You don’t get bus bonuses in the playoffs when you travel to face a top team, only the scoreboard matters.  Let’s make it that way during the regular season too.

Another thing you need to do is name the plan.  Now, I could just name it after myself like the MaxPreps Rankings or the AIA Power Points, but I’m not going to do that.  Going forward, we’ll call it the BPP Plan.  It has four principles.  They can be modified, but we’ll start off with these:

Blow up Power Points

Yes, this is a drastic change.  It’s also where the BPP comes from in the name of the plan.  I know the AIA has used power points for more than 20 years in some way, shape, or form.  I also know that a couple decades before that, power points weren’t used.  We’ll move to a system similar to that, except we will make all 10 games still count.

Make Regions Matter

Earlier this year, Chandler Head Coach Ty Wisdom said that maybe we don’t need regions anymore.  The current ranking structure does not care what region you play your games in, it only looks at the wins, losses, and strength of schedule (heavily).  We are a few years past the point where region winners used to get automatic playoff bids.  Now, the only benefit of being a region champ is getting a nice plaque.

So are we getting rid of them?  No, let’s make them bigger.  We still want kids to be recognized on the All-Region team, but we currently have a region (the 6A East Valley) that has four teams in it!  We are playing a full season to see who is the best out of four teams?

Using the current 58-team 4A, the recommendation is to go with 56 teams.  Send one up to 5A, move one down to 3A, just get to 56.  It’s a nice and round number that works good for eight-school regions.  Region games will be games 4 through 10.  This also makes those first two important under the current transfer rule (where athletes have to sit for five games).

How am I going to construct the regions?  Not my job.  We have conference committees for that.  They may opt to go regionally, so that visiting attendance figures will be better or they may shake it up like the 6A does where you have both top and bottom teams in regions in an effort to balance them out.  That’s up to them and why they are in those positions.

Put the freedom back in freedom games

One of the biggest complaints about schools with a bad SOS is they didn’t really have much of a say in them.  They were placed in a region and given opponents.  Best as I can tell, schools gets to submit a list of preferred non-region opponents and one or two typically get picked.  Let’s give the schools a chance to select those, with a time frame.  Maybe they want to play nearby schools in a different region, maybe renew rivalries, maybe play out of state.

After the regions are constructed and finalized, the region schedules will be drafted.  This lets teams know if they have 4 home, 3 road or vice versa.  That allows them to try and make it an even 5-5 split.

The way it would work is you have a computer spreadsheet with the first three weeks open for every team.  If Team A wants to play at Team B on Week 1, all they need to do is both go into the document, place the game in the box and give approval.  That will lock it in.  If a school wants an out-of-state game, only one approval is needed.

Give schools a month for this.  If there are holes, then the conference committees can go in to fill those.  Remember, we only have three freedom games with larger regions, so there shouldn’t be that many.  If schools don’t fill them in the time frame, they get who they’re given.

Playoff structure

It’s a simplified method where the region games only dictate the tier.  Using our 56-team model, we’d have seven regions.  The region winners would be Tier 1 (1-7), second place teams Tier 2 (8-14), third place teams Tier 3 (15-21).  The three best fourth-place teams would be the last three seeds.  The bracket would be filled in just as it is now with the top eight seeds getting first-round byes.

This way, region winners are rewarded not just with a plaque, but a first-round bye, and a home game in the round of 16.

How do we determine who is 1 and who is 7?  We will use the following tiebreak procedures to place teams within their Tier:

Overall Record
Head-to-Head (if all tied teams played one another)
Point Differential of all 10 games
Coin Flip

The same method would take place to determine 8-14, 15-21, and 22-24.

Ties within a region (to determine Tier) would be broken as follows:

Head-to-Head (if 2 teams)
Overall Record
Point Differential of all 10 games
Coin Flip

That’s it.  This isn’t rocket science.  We don’t need all these formulas that are beyond anyone’s computation (have you ever actually heard anyone explain the MaxPreps formula)?  Yes, MaxPreps will still rank the teams in Arizona just as they do every other state, but we will have our own method to determine the 24 teams that vie for the title.

If the committee opts to stick with stronger regions and weaker regions, will we have some teams that shouldn’t be seeded as high?  Yes.  But everyone knows that going in, so maybe the schools involved would see to it that the committee doesn’t do that.

How will we treat forfeits (since that was an epidemic this year)?  A forfeit will be treated as a 35-0 victory for the winner.  It will count in all point calculations as such.  A win and a +35 for the winner, a loss and a -35 for the loser.  Throwing them out never makes any sense.  This might make teams extra careful to see to it that they don’t have any ineligible players.

Why is strength of schedule essentially being thrown out?  Because we are going with bigger (hopefully balanced hint, hint) regions.  The emphasis is on winning games.

Won’t every school just dumb down their non-region schedule to rack up wins?  That depends.  First, you would need both sides to approve a matchup.  Is a 1-9 team going to instantly accept a state contender?  Probably not.  Also, teams like to have those tougher games to get ready for region play instead of a cupcake schedule.

Will there be a record number of schools that appeal their region placement?  Probably, but that is what that committee will need to sort out.  Also, they will need to make sure to keep them balanced.  If one moves out in the appeals process, it will need to be replaced by one from another region.

Wait, point differential is a factor?  What if teams run it up?  So be it.  Hopefully, they do it within the sportsmanship guidelines that the AIA announces each game.

Best of all, coaches will have the one thing they have been wanting – transparency.  They will know before the season, during the season, and late in the season what they need to get their kids into the playoffs.  Finish in the top 3 in your region (with the 56-team plan), you’re in!

Feel free to throw any questions or comments about the BPP Plan to gridironarizona@yahoo.com and I might address them in a future column.  And if you’re with the AIA and want more details, please let me know and I’ll elaborate or help work through any kinks.

The post OPINION: The system is broken; how can it be fixed? first appeared on Sports360AZ.

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