MHSAA football playoff pairings to be released Sunday

LANSING, Mich. (WILX) - The pairings for this year’s Michigan High School Athletic Association football playoffs will be a little different this year.

A release of all pairings, plus information on purchasing tickets digitally and attendance limits, will be released to schools and the media early Sunday afternoon. Game dates and times will be filled in Monday.

Normally, Fox Sports Detroit would air a selection show the Sunday before the playoffs begin, detailing all the matchups across all divisions for both 11-player football teams and 8-player football teams. However this year that is not the case according to the MHSAA.

Instead, the MHSAA drew the District and Regional groupings early, which has been posted on the MHSAA website. Since there are fewer than 512 11-player teams intending to play, a number of top seeds will receive first-round byes.

MHSAA staff will assign the 8-player pairings Sunday morning. Teams already have been classified as Division 1 or 2 for 8-player; the top 32 in each division based on playoff-point average will qualify.

Teams must have played four games or more to be eligible for the playoffs, or receive a waiver from the MHSAA. Forfeits will also count as part of this total.

If teams withdraw from the playoffs up until the final matchups are released, the MHSAA will reseed those brackets. If a team were to withdraw after the release has been sent, the team withdrawing will forfeit the match and the other team will advance to the next round of the playoffs.