The NCHSAA released the playoff format for this school year, which will be altered due to COVID-19. It looks a lot different and you won't be tracking MaxPreps Rankings or overall winning percentages.
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Good morning!

We've had another week of a lot of news in the world of high school sports, including around COVID-19 and the changes that are being made to high school sports as a result.

This week, the NCHSAA announced what the playoff brackets will look like for volleyball, and it released the generic playoff process for other sports that are typically seeded, such as basketball, soccer, football, baseball, and softball.

The question I've gotten a few times: What does this mean for HighSchoolOT's playoff projections? Well, I've been busy working on spreadsheets so we can start getting projections out for volleyball. The plan is to release the first round this weekend. With the new system (which you can read about below), we'll be able to update them more regularly, so you have that to look forward to.

PREDETERMINED BRACKETS WITH A TWIST
Everything you know about how we've done playoffs in the past, whether it's one of the methods we've used to seed the playoffs or the old predetermined brackets, throw it out and forget about it. The playoff format this year is going to be much different than anything we've seen in the past.

I broke down the playoff format in detail here, but here are some quick points:
  • Each conference will get a set number of automatic qualifiers based on the number of teams participating in a particular sport.
  • Conferences are assigned to the east or west ahead of time. Each region will get 16 teams into the playoffs.
  • Any spots remaining after automatic bids are filled will go to wildcard teams based on their conference winning percentage.
  • Once the qualifiers are determined, all conference champions will be randomly drawn and placed on a line in the bracket, followed by any second place automatic qualifiers. After that, any third place automatic qualifiers and the wildcard qualifiers will be drawn together and placed on a line.
It's worth noting that the playoffs are going to be reduced by half this year due to the condensed calendar caused by the pandemic. Football will also be subdivided still, which I wrote about at the bottom of this article.

WHAT THIS PLAYOFF FORMAT ISN'T
It's important to emphasize that this playoff format is specifically created for this school year -- the one impacted so heavily by the coronavirus pandemic. You should not assume this is the playoff format the NCHSAA will use going forward in the new realignment process.

However, we do know the NCHSAA is going to have to overhaul the playoff format with the new realignment procedures in place, Commissioner Que Tucker said as much a couple weeks ago, so we should pay attention to the nuts and bolts of how the playoffs will work this year. It would make sense if the NCHSAA were to use the COVID year to test out possibilities for the playoffs going forward.

For example, it's notable that the NCHSAA has assigned conferences to specific regions this year, that will happen in the new realignment too. So will this playoff format look similar to what we see down the road? It's possible, but we will have to wait and see.

FINAL HSOT WEBINARS ANNOUNCED
Before 2020 comes to an end, we have two more HighSchoolOT Webinars presented by Bojangles to get to.

Our next webinar will be next week -- Tuesday, Dec. 22, at 6;30 p.m. The topic: Social Media & High School Sports.

I'm really excited for this one. It's an important topic for athletic departments from a branding perspective, but it's also important for athletes. And we have a fantastic panel!
  • Matt Sutor, Carolina Hurricanes Social Media Manager
  • Gabe Henderson, Minnesota Vikings Entertainment Network Host, Producer, Analyst; Former Southeast Raleigh HS quarterback
  • Evan Moesta, Carolina Mudcats Manager of Multimedia; Social Media for Millbrook Boys Basketball
It's free to attend all HighSchoolOT Webinars. To register for the social media webinar, click here.

Our final webinar of 2020 will take place on Wednesday, Dec. 29, at 7 p.m. This webinar topic is: High School Sports Year in Review.

For this final webinar, you can join the entire HighSchoolOT team as we look back at high school sports in 2020 and look ahead to the big stories of 2021. We'll answer all of your questions too.

To register for the year in review webinar, click here.

BRUNSWICK COUNTY HITS PAUSE ON SPORTS
As concerns grow about the spread of COVID-19 during the holidays, Brunswick County Schools decided to hit pause on some sports until mid-January.

On Tuesday, Brunswick County Schools announced it was temporarily pausing activities in basketball, lacrosse, and football through Jan. 18. Other sports were not included in this pause.

This means West Brunswick, South Brunswick, and North Brunswick will miss the first two weeks of the basketball regular season and will begin lacrosse regular season practices a week late.

I noted on Twitter this week, if we are beginning to see a trend of school districts pausing high school sports, it's happening in the reverse fashion from the spring and summer. When sports were about to start back up in June, the large districts were the holdouts. Now, we're starting to see small districts slow things down. Whether or not it's a trend is TBD.

Around The State
Here are some high school sports stories and important links you might have missed from around the state this week:
  • Brunswick County's decision to pause some sports means its conference members have to adjust the basketball schedule. According to Tim Hower of CoastalPreps, that schedule is now set.
  • Jonathan Bym of The Pilot posted a Twitter thread about realignment concerns from some in Moore County. Union Pines is not thrilled about its placement, and one board of education member called the realignment process "affirmative action."
  • The Fayetteville Observer looked at an issue that high school football players throughout NC are having to think about: Should they graduate early and go to college or stay and play their senior seasons of high school football?

WHAT WERE SOME OF YOUR TOP STORIES OF 2020?
We're beginning to work on our end of year coverage at HighSchoolOT, and that includes looking at some of the top stories of 2020.

Obviously, the coronavirus pandemic is the biggest story of the year for just about everything -- including high school sports. But there are other big stories that happened. Realignment, elimination of the subdivided football playoffs, approval of eight-man football, UNC's in-state recruiting haul, incredible success of female athletes in winter sports, and many more.

So what were some of the top stories from your perspective? I'd love to hear your ideas. Feel free to email me at nstevens@wral.com.

IN-STATE ACC SCHOOLS SIGN NC PLAYERS
Wednesday brought National Signing Day for many football players across the state, and the four in-state ACC schools each landed North Carolina high school football talent.

UNC brought in more in-state talent than any other school with 15 signees from the Tar Heel State. It's one of the best recruiting classes in the nation too. NC State was close behind with 12 in-state signees. Duke & Wake Forest both had four signees from North Carolina.

Here are details for the ACC schools and other universities in the state:

NEW HSOT RANKINGS IN VOLLEYBALL, BASKETBALL
Earlier this week, new rankings were released for volleyball and basketball on HighSchoolOT.

In volleyball, Green Hope, the reigning four-time 4A state champion, has returned to the top of the East rankings. In the West, defending 2A state champion Fred T. Foard remains at No. 1. To see the full volleyball rankings for both regions, click here.

For NCISAA basketball, the top teams did not change. In boys basketball, Carmel Christian is still ranked No. 1. Meanwhile, Providence Day's girls basketball team is atop the poll. Click here to see the full basketball rankings.

We'll be including NCHSAA basketball teams in rankings when their seasons begin in January.

ICYMI This Week on HSOT
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Enloe kicker Laith Marjan commits to ECU
Five-star kicker Laith Marjan announced his commitment to East Carolina on Wednesday. Marjan was all-conference last season, connected on 14-of-22 field goal attempts and 69-of-75 extra-point attempts.
Read More
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Burlington School's Jamarii Thomas commits to UNCW
After averaging 15.6 points per game last season, senior guard Jamarii Thomas announced his commitment to UNC-Wilmington this week.
Read More
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VB: Perquimans rallies past Currituck, stays unbeaten
Undefeated Perquimans found itself trailing Currituck 2-0 going into the third set, but Perquimans rallied to win the final three sets to stay unbeaten.
Read More

What I'm Watching
As I mentioned earlier, I am working on setting up spreadsheets for volleyball playoff projections. I expect to release the first round of projections this weekend, hopefully on Saturday. If you're curious about what the volleyball field will look like, check out this information released by the NCHSAA this week.

We'll send alerts to the HighSchoolOT app when our playoff projections are released, so make sure you download that on your phone if you haven't already.

Also, tune into "On The Record" this weekend. I'll be a guest on the show to talk about high school sports during the pandemic and the mask mandate that has been issued by the NCHSAA. WRAL anchor Gerald Owens is hosting, and there will be other guests -- a coach, players, and a doctor -- on the panel. "On The Record" airs on WRAL at 7:30 PM on Saturday and on WRAZ/FOX 50 at 8:30 AM on Sunday. We'll also have it on HighSchoolOT on Saturday night.

I hope everyone has a great weekend.

Nick

Thank you for reading the HighSchoolOT Newsletter this week. Do you have suggestions, comments, or concerns? You can email me any time at nstevens@wral.com.
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