FHSAA changes football ranking, classification system
Florida high school football will see some radical changes in the fall, with the Florida High School Athletics Association changing both the ways teams are classified and ranked.
The new system, approved Wednesday by a 9-7 vote of the FHSAA Board of Directors, splits schools into Metro and Suburban classifications.
The framework uses 2021 fall enrollment numbers and the number of schools that have committed to the FHSAA State Series for the upcoming reclassification cycle that will start this fall.
Lee County is one of 59 counties that will be categorized as Suburban.
The Suburban counties will break down like this:
Class 4A-Suburban: 1,893 students and up – 68 schools
Class 3A-Suburban: 1,443-1,892 – 68 schools
Class 2A-Suburban: 601-1,442 – 68 schools
Class 1A-Suburban: 600 and below – 30 schools
Going by this past year’s enrollment numbers, things might wind up looking like this:
Class 4A-Suburban: Ida Baker
Class 3A-Suburban: Cape Coral, Island Coast, Mariner, North Fort Myers
Class 2A-Suburban: Bishop Verot, Oasis
If that’s how it works out, only Ida Baker would see much change among local schools.
The eight Metro counties are Duval, Seminole, Orange, Hillsborough, Pinellas, Palm Beach, Broward and Miami-Dade.
Class 4A-Metro: 2,356 and up – 64 schools
Class 3A-Metro: 1,675-2,355 – 64 schools
Class 2A-Metro: 601-1,674 – 64 schools
Class 1A-Metro: 600 and below – 36 schools
There is also a Rural class for some of the state’s smallest high schools.
Class 1A-Rural: 600 and below – 33 schools
Qualifications for playoffs:
Classes 4A-2A (Metro & Suburban): 4 regions, 16 districts:
District play is required
District champions advance, along with the next four in each region as at-large teams
Class 1A (Metro, Suburban & Rural):
4 regions, no districts
Top 6 in each region advance
At-large teams will no longer be determined by the Ratings Percentage Index (RPI), which the FHSAA has used since 2019. The new FHSAA Power Rankings will use MaxPreps’ proprietary formula, except for margin of victory.
MaxPreps already sets the rankings in other FHSAA team sports.
All this could take up to a month to get all the schools set into their new classifications.