NCHSAA defines new 8A classification

The North Carolina High School Athletic Association (NCHSAA) this week set the parameters for its soon-to-be new largest classification starting in the 2025-26 school year, the biggest move from its annual spring meetings held Tuesday and Wednesday in Chapel Hill.

The NCHSAA board of directors voted unanimously to approve a “Big 32” realignment model recommendation from the bylaw task force committee, in which only the state’s largest 32 schools will compete at the 8A classification.

The other member schools will be divided evenly among the lower seven classifications.

Additionally, the committee proposed 24-to-28 team brackets for the 8A state playoffs, 32-team brackets for 2A through 7A, and 16-team 1A brackets.

And the committee also recommended that realignment be moved from every four years to every two years with extra classes likely meaning extra movement by schools along the classes. That realignment, however, would not impact conferences, which would still remain in place for four-year cycles.

Those prospective changes must be approved by a 75 percent vote of member schools in order to take effect.

The committee also recommended a six-school minimum for conferences and for split-classification conferences to remain in existence, though with the number of classes in each conference limited to the current number of two. However, the committee noted that limiting split leagues to two classes “may not be possible in some areas of the state,” per a HighSchoolOT.com report.

The NCHSAA also nailed down that its first draft of its statewide realignment that will go into effect for the 2025-26 school year will be coming this fall.

The state announced at its winter meetings the plan to move from four classes up to eight and has said that 2024-25 average daily membership (ADM) numbers will be used solely to determine classifications for realignment.

Among other significant changes made this week included: the same number of umpires as in the regional and state baseball and softball championships will now be used starting in the third round of the NCHSAA playoffs; and all basketball games (up to six maximum) that non-football playing schools have until football schools’ first contest date will not be included in RPI rankings for playoff seeding. 

However, the NCHSAA did not revamp its RPI system which is used to seed playoff teams. A proposal had called for more weight on a team’s win percentage and less weight on its opponents’ opponents’ win percentage.

The NCHSAA also says its Final Four basketball format which was new in 2024 will be used again in 2025, and that Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Winston-Salem will once again host all games.

Paul Schenkel can be reached at 828-445-8595 or paul@thepaper.media.