New football districts have Waukon, Kee grid programs on the move

In addition to new district alignments, changes also made to play-off qualifying and postseason play.

The Iowa High School Athletic Association (IHSAA) has released the new Iowa high school football districts for the 2016 and 2017 fall seasons. Both the Waukon and Kee football teams will be moving to different districts - at least by name, as several of the same teams both schools have faced in district play the last two seasons will also be moving with the Indians and Hawks.

WAUKON MOVES TO CLASS 2A DISTRICT 4
For Waukon, the next two seasons will involve a move from Class 2A District 3 to District 4. Moving with the Indians will be two of the other three State Play-Off qualifying teams from this past 2015 season, including Dyersville Beckman and semifinalist North Fayette Valley, the only team to beat the Indians last fall. Fellow District 3 teams Oelwein and Waterloo Columbus will also be moving with the Indians to District 4.
Remaining in District 4 will be one of last season’s State Play-Off qualifiers in Cascade, along with Monticello. The eighth team rounding out Class 2A District 4 will be Union of La Porte City out of District 6.
The other two teams from last season’s District 3 have also moved elsewhere. State-qualifying New Hampton has moved to Class 2A District 2, and Center Point-Urbana has moved to Class 3A District 4.
“Clearly, we lost a good team in New Hampton, but Union should be very tough this year as they had a lot of juniors playing,” Waukon football coach Chad Beermann shared in reflecting on the new football districts. “North Fayette Valley brings back most of their team from last year, and Beckman is always a top team. We played Monticello in the play-offs in 2013, and Cascade has also been a play-off team. We keep Columbus and Oelwein from last season.
“I’m not a tremendous fan of the travel, especially with Cresco and New Hampton an hour or less away and not in the district, so we’ll have to look at them for the non-district games. It’s always odd to drive through a school district you aren’t playing in district (New Hampton) to get to one you are (Columbus). I believe one of the criteria the IHSAA will look at for the at-large bids is cross-district head-to-head. Clearly, this will be another tough district to qualify out of, especially with the halving of the play-off spots.”

CHANGES IN PLAY-OFF QUALIFICATION
Following an earlier decision to reduce, by half, the number of State Play-Off qualifying teams in each class from 32 to 16, such as it was several years ago, the IHSAA Football Advisory Committee also made a change in the number of districts and qualifying terms for Classes A, 1A, 2A and 3A.
The 56-team classes of 3A, 2A, 1A and A will each have seven districts of eight teams, with each district champion automatically qualifying for their respective State Play-Offs, as well as two other “at-large” qualifiers. The move to seven districts of eight teams will eliminate the need for a non-district game to be figured into schedules later in the season, as has been the case for the past several years.
Those two “at-large” qualifiers will be determined by the following criteria:
1. Anyone considered a district champion (such as the case this past fall when Waukon, North Fayette Valley and Dyersville Beckman all ended the season with district championship records of 5-1).
2. Best district record.
3. Head-to-head competition (district and non-district, making non-district schedule choices within a team’s same class being a crucial decision).
4. Tie-breaker differential within the district (see new point differential rule below).
5. A random draw, drawing a letter from the alphabet and teams closest to that letter (going from A-Z, according to the IHSAA directory for that year is the qualifier).

Both the Eight-Player and 4A classes will each have eight districts, with the champion and runner-up from each district automatically qualifying to make up the 16-team State Play-Off brackets. Class 4A will have eight districts with six teams in each, with Eight-Player having six districts with eight teams and two districts with seven teams, including Kee’s District 3.

 The IHSAA Football Advisory Committee also voted to make the following additional changes within State Play-Off qualifying and postseason play for all classes:
• Increase the 13-point tie-breaker differential to 17 points. With the recommendation of at-large qualifiers for the postseason, the increase in the tie-breaker differential should reduce the need for the alphabetical tie-breaker to determine qualifiers. Also, with the trend toward spread offenses, most coaches do not feel that a game is “in hand” with a point differential of 13 points, as 17 points is a three-score differential.
• Eliminate the 125-mile limitation for the first round of the play-offs. With play-off games now being played Friday nights due to the smaller play-off qualifying field, it is not as important to “protect” the time students return from the game because there is no class the next day. Also, this helps provide the opportunity to eliminate district rematches between the #1 and #2 seeds from the same district in the first round.
• Instead of creating match-ups upon completion of each round, a bracket system should be created so each team can see its potential opponents throughout the play-offs. The bracket system provides teams the opportunity to prepare scouting reports for potential opponents. It also allows fans to follow their favorite teams as they progress through the play-offs.

KEE MOVES TO EIGHTPLAYER DISTRICT 3
The Kee football Hawks will be moving from Eight-Player District 4 to District 3, taking with them State Play-Off qualifier and quarterfinalist Central Elkader, along with Central City and West Central from District 4. Cedar Valley Christian and last-season State qualifiers Midland and Springville will remain in District 4, with District 4’s other State qualifier, Turkey Valley, making the move to Eight-Player District 2.
Tripoli will be the only Eight-Player District 3 to remain in that district for the next two seasons. Rounding out that District 3 line-up will be Dunkerton and Don Bosco from District 5, with Don Bosco being a perennial State Play-Off qualifier and finishing as last fall’s Eight-Player State Runner-Up.
“I was a little surprised at how our district ended up shaking out,” Kee football coach Chad Winters said. “Typically, Central Elkader, West Central and Kee end up going the same direction and it is a matter of which way we go. The addition of perennial power Don Bosco to our district was a bit of a surprise.  That addition, along with the play-off qualifying change, leaves little room for error during district play.”

Now that the new districts have been released, schools will have until February 1 to submit their priority lists for non-district opponents on their schedules, with the exception of the Eight-Player class. Due to limited participation and travel distances, the IHSAA will be determining non-district opponents for all Eight-Player schools. Once the non-district opponent priorities have been submitted, it is anticipated the complete schedules for the 2016 and 2017 Iowa high school football seasons will be released by the IHSAA in early March.