IHSA Announcements

The Illinois High School Association today released sample maps illustrating the three- and four-class systems that will be utilized in selected sports beginning with the 2007-08 school term. The maps were presented and discussed at Town Meetings held in November.

“Based on the discussion at the 28 Town Meetings held all across Illinois, it’s clear that our member schools are very supportive of the Association moving forward with class expansion,” said IHSA Executive Director Marty Hickman. “We realize a change of this magnitude will be unsettling to some people. We want to make sure there are as few surprises as possible, and posting these models is one way to ease the transition.”

The following sports will be conducted in four classes starting in 2007-08: girls volleyball, girls basketball, boys basketball, girls softball, and boys baseball.

The following sports will be conducted in three classes starting in 2007-08: boys golf, girls cross country, boys cross country, girls track and field, and boys track and field.

Structure Changes

The tournament structure in bracketed team sports is based on the responses to last year’s membership survey and the work of an ad-hoc committee formed last spring to review the seeding and grouping policy.

In Class 1A and 2A bracketed team sports, all state tournament series will be grouped in sub-sectionals. The top four seeds in each sub-sectional will be distributed by seed to pre-determined regional sites. Seeds #1 and #4 will be assigned to the same regional unless there is a hosting conflict. The remaining schools will feed into the regionals based on geography.

In Class 3A and 4A bracketed team sports, there are significant changes. Two systems will be used. In the Chicago suburban area, all state tournament series will begin with sectional complexes, using true seeds unless conflicts arise from the seeds of the pre-determined regional hosts. All sectional groups that lie substantially outside of the Chicago suburban area will begin with geographic regionals. Geographic regionals, which were used in all team bracketed sports prior to 1991, are designed to minimize travel in areas of the state that do not have a high density of schools.

Sample Maps

The sample maps illustrate how schools might be grouped in a three- and four-class system. The three-class sample shown is for boys cross country while the four-class sample is for boys basketball. Other sports will have similar groupings.

It is important to note that these maps are only samples. The actual groupings will undoubtedly be different. Likewise, the groupings used in one sport will be different from the groupings used in another sport. The sites were chosen at random from within each regional or sectional grouping.

The information provided is based on this year’s enrollment and membership data. Undoubtedly there will be modest adjustments for the 2007-08 school year.

Keys to the Maps

On the maps, each school entered is represented by the first few letters of the schools's name. In the four-class basketball samples, each sectional is indicated by a group of schools converging on a single sectional site and designated by a color. A possible division between sub-sectionals is given by a black line.

In the Class 3A and 4A basketball maps, schools are grouped into regionals instead of sectionals where appropriate (when the sectional lies significantly outside the Chicago area).

On the three-class cross country maps, all groups indicate regionals. Four regionals make up a sectional, which is designated by a color.

The numbers after the name of the host school indicate how many schools are assigned to that site or to each of the site's sub-sectionals.