8-player football will remain alive and well

Eight-player football appears to be alive and well in Oregon high schools, and Mapleton is headed to a new seven-school special district.

Those were among the headlines of Wednesday's meeting of the Oregon School Activities Association's football ad hoc committee tasked with forming special districts for the next school year.

Proposed leagues for 2A and below were included in Friday's committee meeting update.

No list was included for 3A schools and above, but the committee has two more meetings — Jan. 19 and Feb. 2 — before the expected final decision in February.

Siuslaw likely will be in a special district similar to the new Class 3A Mountain Valley Conference which the Vikings join next school year for soccer, volleyball, basketball, baseball and softball.

The Mountain Valley Conference includes Creswell, Elmira, Harrisburg, La Pine, Pleasant Hill and Sisters. Harrisburg is among 16 schools that have made written requests to play down, so probably will not be in the football special district with Siuslaw.

Mapleton has been assigned to a 6-player league that includes Crow, Eddyville Charter, Jewell, McKenzie, Siletz Valley and Triangle Lake.

It appears the committee has abandoned plans to impose a 9-player game while eliminating the existing 8-man game.

Instead, there would be three separate divisions for 2A and 1A going forward, featuring 11-player, 8-player and 6-player models.

From the update:

"After lengthy discussion the group reached consensus on making several adjustments to their original draft 9‐player model proposed at the December 20 meeting. Cut‐off points outlined below could be adjusted depending on the number of schools moving between the three groups.

Recommends that the 2A schools (ADM 75‐145) play the 11‐player game
Recommends that the 1A schools (ADM 74‐61) play the 8‐player game
Recommends that the 6‐player game type upper cut‐off moves from 55 to 60.

"This change does not prohibit schools from participating in the 9‐player game type when necessary and appropriate."

The full update is available online at https://www.osaa.org/docs/committees/football/01052022update.pdf