(10-17-26) Last night the Illinois High School Association (IHSA) held its annual football playoff selectionshow.
This year is the first season of the new expanded playoffs.
The IHSA expanded the Illinois high school football playoffs from 256 teams to 384 teams for the 2026 season — an increase of 128 teams.
Around Illinois
AI Muse Assisted post
A losing record used to mean the season was over. Not anymore.
When the IHSA expanded its football playoffs from 256 to 384 teams for the 2026 season — 48 per class instead of 32 — it opened the door to teams that once would have been long forgotten. The result: 131 at-large qualifiers below .500 earned their way in on playoff points, the largest such class in Illinois history.
The numbers
•61 teams at 4-5
•52 teams at 3-6
•18 teams at 2-7
Every one of them qualified on the strength of schedule — the “Opp W” and “Def. Opp W” columns that make up Illinois’ playoff-point system. A team that played tough opponents and beat good ones gets in over a team with the same record that didn’t.
4-5: The near-miss crowd
Yorkville leads the entire at-large class with 55 opponent wins — the Foxes played a schedule worthy of a top seed but came out on the short end of five games. LaGrange Park’s Nazareth Academy, Decatur’s St. Teresa and Chicago’s Simeon each piled up 52 opponent wins, putting them at the top of the pile.
The group reads like a “who’s who” of programs that are used to playing in November: Oak Park-River Forest, Palatine, Lincolnshire Stevenson, Wheaton St. Francis, Gurnee Warren and Edwardsville are all in. Chicago’s Whitney Young and Lincoln Park are in. Downstate, Peoria High, East Peoria, Bloomington, Quincy Notre Dame and Marion all punched tickets.
3-6: Household names, losing records
This is where the expansion shows its teeth. Naperville Neuqua Valley — a program that has played for state titles — is in at 3-6. So are St. Charles East, Carol Stream’s Glenbard North, Aurora’s Marmion Academy, Chicago’s DePaul College Prep and Mundelein’s Carmel. Woodstock Marian tops the 3-6 class with 50 opponent wins.
The group spans the state: from Carpentersville’s Dundee-Crown and Aurora’s Waubonsie Valley in the suburbs, to Springfield High, Peoria Richwoods, Champaign Centennial and Collinsville downstate, to small-school programs like Marengo, Momence, Oregon and Mendota.
2-7: The longest of long shots
Eighteen teams made it with just two wins. The poster child: Effingham, with 55 opponent wins — more than all but one team in the entire at-large field. The Hearts lost seven games but they lost them to good teams.
Tinley Park’s Andrew (54 opponent wins), Lisle’s Benet Academy (50), Roselle’s Lake Park (50) and Shelbyville (50) round out the top of the 2-7 class. In all, 18 programs get a postseason they never could have dreamed of under the old 32-team system.
Why it happened
IHSA member schools approved the expansion last December, moving each class from 32 to 48 teams — 128 more playoff spots statewide. Executive Director Craig Anderson said the goal was long-term stability: ending the incentive for schools to switch conferences just to find a fifth win, and letting quality programs schedule tough opponents without fear that one loss ruins the season.
The new system worked exactly as designed. Teams that played hard schedules got rewarded for it — even at 2-7.
Remember: As you watch the playoff pairings show tonight, IHSA football playoff expansion passed a vote of member schools, 377–252. The membership approved this format.
If you’re frustrated with 2-win qualifiers, the brackets or who receives a bye, don’t start yelling at the…
With the expansion of the IHSA football playoffs growing from 256 teams to 384 teams, the result is the addition of several 3-6 and 2-7 teams receiving a playoff berth. This is unchartered territory in Illinois. The problem is, the pairings which were announced tonight have… pic.twitter.com/kqlHWNUZRx
