Illinois High School Association member schools began voting Monday on 11 proposals advanced by the Legislative Commission to make changes to the IHSA Constitution and By-Laws, including one that would expand the football playoffs as soon as the 2026 season.
According to an IHSA press release, each member school receives one online ballot, and voting continues until midnight on Monday, December 15. The votes will then be tabulated and results posted on Tuesday, December 16. A simple majority of “yes” or “no” votes will determine whether each proposal passes, though a school can cast a “no opinion” vote. Most proposals, if approved, would take effect in the 2026-27 school year, unless otherwise noted.
There were originally two football proposals being considered, one a simple playoff expansion, the other a more drastic restructuring of the prep football landscape in Illinois through the creation of a new “flex” district format. Following a month-long series of town hall meetings with school officials, only the simplified expansion model, introduced by Monticello High School, was promoted to the all-school ballot.
Under the plan being voted on, the size of each of the eight playoff classes would be increased from 32 to 48 teams, with the top 16 seeded teams in each division receiving a first-round bye. To facilitate the extra week of playoff football the bye week would necessitate, the start of the entire season would be moved up by one week. In other words, the pre-season scrimmage, known as Week Zero, would be eliminated and replaced with Week 1 regular-season games. That way, a nine-game regular-season schedule (which would then match the Indiana football calendar) would be maintained, with state championship games still played over the Thanksgiving weekend, as they are now.
The first two rationales that proponents cited for passage are more opportunities for schools, with the expansion to 48 teams per class increasing access to the postseason, in addition to eliminating the long-standing problem of conference instability. By removing the “drive for five,” as schools term the hunt for enough wins to become playoff-eligible, conference realignments that destabilize long-standing rivalries won’t be as frequent.
What would that mean for the Little Illini Conference, which last year qualified five teams for the football post-season, the biggest playoff haul in five years? Backers of the expansion proposal offered simulated bracket assignments based on the 2023 and 2024 seasons as evidence, and it showed that the LIC would have gained even more playoff entries.
For example, the 2023 simulation had the league landing five teams, as opposed to the four who did play under the current setup. In 2024, the LIC only sent three teams to the playoffs, but under the new proposal, six teams would have made it.
Record-wise, the simulation showed a handful of 2-7 teams would have made the field in each division, including two from the Little Illini.
The remaining proposals up for adoption deal with a wide range of topics and sports, including season limitations, summer workouts, eligibility, classification, co-op and non-sport team matters, among other issues.
