CIF Football Regional Bowls (HS Football)

[DaRadniz29]

Haven't really followed prep football this much in a while, but every once in a while, I'll peek at Maxpreps and Calpreps to see how De La Salle, CCS and Pac-5 teams are doing. This year they're going bonkers with Bowl Games!!

For those that don't know, California has no true high school state playoff tournament. The other state in the same boat is New Jersey. What California does have is "Bowl Games". For the last few years the state has increased the number of bowl games going from 1-3-5 and then last couple of years they did Regional Bowl Games.

This year the CIF has expanded the Regional Bowl Games to 14 in the North and 13 in the South. Divisions are as follows:

Open

1AA and 1A

2AA and 2A

3AA and 3A

4AA and 4A

5AA and 5A

Open: Small Schools (enrollment of <1250)

6AA: Three teams qualify, with one playing the winner of the play-in game (Stone Ridge Christian vs Mission-SF).

Each Division (1AA-Open Small) above will have 4 teams above (2 North and 2 South).

The top team in the North (projected: De La Salle) and top team in the South (projected: winner of Centennial (Corona)/St. John Bosco) will be placed in a SBG and will have no regional.

Here are the number of qualifiers get per section:

North Coast - 5; Central Section - 6; Central Coast - 5; Northern - 4; Oakland -1; SF - 1;

Sac-Joaquin - 7; Southern - 13; LA City - 3; San Diego - 6.

Central Section's Divisions 1, 3, 5 will be placed in the north.

Central Section Divisions: 2, 4, 6 will be in the South.

The CIF Bowl Selection Committee will make sure Central Sections do not play each other in a Championship Bowl Game.

Two teams from will be placed into each grouping. Only Section Division champs are eligible, except for the CCS (Central Coast) which will send it's three Open Division Champs and two of the three runners-up.

So the CCS knows 4/5 teams going: Bellarmine, St. Francis, Oak Grove and Milpitas are locked in. The Winner of the Open III Section championship between Riordan and Sacred Heart Prep will be the 5th spot.

The winners of the Regional Bowl Games will face the North-South opponent from the same classification.

Personally, I think it's much less convoluted to just have a state playoff, but because California is run by somewhat independent Sections and eliminating the sectional playoffs seems to be a no go when discussing a potential state playoff.

Anyway, while I didn't expect to spend this much time into prep football, it's somewhat exciting and now after trying to do my own mock state playoff I'm now way more invested than I should be. At least my Alma mater has a chance to go bowling.

Let me know if you need clarity on this - because as can you see I've studied this quite a bit

I'll post the projected matchups in a little bit.

Here's the qualification bylaws, etc.

[DarkJourney]

De La Salle hasn't lost a game to a Northern California opponent since the '91 NCS 3A Championship Game (Pittsburg). Crazy!