We’re in the midst of March Madness, the ultimate postseason tournament in all of sports.

There are 364 schools who have Division I men’s basketball. Just 68 teams get to play in the NCAA Tournament though: That’s 18.7% of the Division I programs.

Making the NCAA Tournament is an accomplishment. It’s a reward for a successful regular season or conference tournament.

There are blowouts in March Madness. We’ve seen quite a few of them over the last week. But there are also some epic finishes, Cinderella runs, buzzer-beaters, and upsets. Generally speaking though, the best teams during the regular season play in the later rounds of the tournament.

We live in North Carolina. It’s Tobacco Road. Our Division I schools have won many national championships in March (or April). Our state has hosted NCAA Tournament games. We are an important part of the college basketball world, and we know what makes March special.

Which brings me to the high school playoffs in North Carolina.

The N.C. High School Athletic Association announced the new playoff structure for the 2025-2026 school year as it expands from four to eight classes. The plan also includes a massive expansion in the number of teams that will qualify for the postseason.

Right now, there are four classifications made up of 442 schools. In sports where brackets are made for each classification, 256 teams make the playoffs — that’s 64 teams in each classification, or 57.9% of the total membership. That percentage is actually higher in most sports because not every school fields a team in every sport.

For example, there may be 100 schools in a classification, but if only 90 offer a particular sport and 64 teams qualify for the playoffs, 71% of the schools playing that sport in that classification have a spot in the postseason.

At the December board meeting, the NCHSAA said there will be a net gain of two schools in the NCHSAA next year, bringing the total to 444. But the new playoff structure will admit 360 teams into the playoffs — 48 teams in the 1A-7A classes, and 24 teams in the 8A class.

That’s a whopping 81.1% of the total NCHSAA membership. And again, that percentage is likely to be higher when you consider not every school plays every sport.

But why?

The Bylaw Committee’s proposal that was approved by the NCHSAA Board of Directors was shared publicly on Monday. The proposal includes four points of rationale:

• Balanced Participation: Allowing only 32 teams will not be sufficient. Conversely, allowing every team into the playoffs would be too many. A 48-team bracket serves as an optimal middle ground, providing schools in the multi-classification conferences a fair chance to compete.
• Increased Competitiveness: By granting the top 16 teams in each classification a first-round bye, we can ensure that initial matchups are more competitive, addressing past concerns about “blowouts” that detracted from the experience for athletes and schools; thereby reducing the likelihood of unbalanced games.
• Reducing Pressure to Opt-Out: It would alleviate the pressure on schools to consider opting out of the playoffs, fostering greater community support for participation with more competitive first-round games.
• Equity in Playoffs: It would create more equitable opportunities for student-athletes across classifications, promoting inclusivity and aligning with the current emphasis on fair representation in athletics.

I question why 32 teams is not sufficient. That would be more than half of the schools in the 1A-7A classifications making the playoffs: 56.1% in 1A, 54.2% in 2A-5A, 55.2% in 6A, and 53.3% in 7A. If you have 16 teams in the 8A class, that would be 50% of the schools making the playoffs.

Right now, with four classifications, 61.5% of the 4A teams make the playoffs, 57.7% make it in 3A, 60.4% qualify in 2A, and 52.5% qualify in 1A.

The new plan means at least 84.2% of 1A schools will qualify for the playoffs. That number is 81.4% in 2A-5A, 82.8% in 6A, 80% in 7A, and 75% in 8A. This is what the rationale calls the “optimal middle ground.”

Here’s the question I would like to hear an honest answer to: Do we believe there are any teams left out of the state playoffs today who have a legitimate shot at winning a state championship? I do not. We play state tournaments to determine a state champion, not to provide exhibition games. Unless there are teams left out who could win a state title, I have a hard time understanding why we should allow 104 more teams into the playoffs.

The Bylaw Committee specifically mentioned the desire to reduce the number of blowouts in the playoffs. If that is the desire, the correct move would be to reduce the number of teams in the playoffs. Yes, the top 16 seeds will have first-round byes in the new format, but that does not mean blowouts are going to go away — or even become less common. In fact, we may see more blowouts in the playoffs because there are more lower-end teams being granted playoff berths.

In terms of the last point from the Bylaw Committee, having equity in sports is important. But the equitable opportunities for teams in the playoffs comes from having the same opportunity in the regular season to qualify for the playoffs. If every school has the same chance to compete within the same rules, playing the same number of games, etc — that’s equity.

Simply adding more teams to the playoffs doesn’t create equity, it just moves the cutoff line somewhere else. If everyone having a chance to play a playoff game was the goal, then the committee should have just allowed every team in the playoffs. That would not even increase the number of rounds needed to complete the playoffs, it would just do away with some of the first-round byes.

The bottom line

Expanding the number of classifications from four to eight is not easy and it requires a lot of change. It’s not simple, and I acknowledge it’s a difficult job.

Many of the changes we have seen in this realignment period are based on a simple premise though: the size of the school determines how competitive it will be in sports. This is why the new bylaw specifically says classes are determined based solely on a school’s enrollment, a change from the current realignment which also considered past athletic success and the economic status of the school.

There is no doubt that the size of a school’s enrollment is a factor in athletic success, but there is ample evidence that it is not the factor in athletic success. It’s simply one factor. Enrollment figures are more impactful in a sport like football where depth is so crucial (although still not the sole factor), but small schools can and do successfully compete with larger schools in sports all the time — football included.

Assuming that adding more teams to the playoffs but breaking them apart into more classifications based on their school size will increase the competitiveness in any sport is flawed logic. “Good” teams are “good” teams, regardless of how many students attend the school.

Expanding the number of classifications does not expand the number of “good” teams or reduce the number of “bad” teams. The net effect of moving to eight classes is likely to be that every class becomes more top heavy. That means there are fewer teams to compete with the best teams in each classification. It also means the less-competitive teams are going to take a higher share of the playoff berths.

Long story short, I don’t buy the competitiveness argument.

Now, I could be convinced that adding more teams to the state playoffs is a good idea for other reasons.

For instance, the NCHSAA budget has been running in the red for multiple years since the pandemic. Recent legislation now restricts the NCHSAA’s ability to create revenue for itself outside of the state playoffs, and it limits how much money the NCHSAA can take from playoff game ticket sales. If the NCHSAA needs to have more playoff games to remain solvent, then it is what it is. The money has to work or nothing else matters.

If schools are asking for more playoff game opportunities so they can make more money to help ends meet, I’m all for it. However, that would be in contradiction to some of the concerns the board has heard recently about schools losing money from playoff games.

Or, if the goal was just to provide more students an opportunity to play in state playoff games without regard to regular season performance, I would disagree strongly with that sentiment, but the new playoff format would accomplish that goal.

None of these situations were discussed in the rationale document from the Bylaw Committee though. If we’re really talking about making our playoffs more competitive, this is not the way.

We know the way.

March Madness has shown us the way.

You have to be in the top 18% of Division I men’s basketball to make the NCAA Tournament. You have to have a good (sometimes great) regular season. There are teams every year with good regular season records who miss the tournament, and that makes playing in the Big Dance a true reward.

I’m not suggesting we only admit 18% of high schools to the state playoffs, that would be ridiculous. What I am suggesting is that the best teams should be rewarded for good seasons with a chance to play for a state championship. That’s the purpose of the state playoffs.

That is competitive.

And as long as every school had the same opportunity to qualify for the playoffs during the regular season, that is also equitable.