LHSAA postpones votes on playoff structure

Principals voted to postpone votes regarding a playoff structure enacted by the Louisiana High School Athletic Association’s executive committee on the final day of the LHSAA’s annual meeting in Baton Rouge.

The postponement allows for a special session of sorts to be called this summer and not disrupt the current season.

In September, the executive committee, under the guise of the association’s Article 4.4.4, changed definitions of what constitutes a select and non-select school, bringing the numbers of each schools across the state to nearly a 50-50 split. In conjunction with that move, the executive committee also approved playoff alignments of four divisions on each side in football and five divisions in other sports impacted by the split – boys and girls basketball, baseball and softball.

Meetings on Thursday set the stage for the postponement, taking much of the drama away from Friday morning’s full session of principals from around the state and setting the stage for another high-stakes meeting, probably in June.

The vote to maintain the status quo for the remainder of the 2022-23 school year was 300-66.

Among other proposals passed that will take effect for the 2023-24 school year, boys/co-ed bowling will add a second division and softball will have the higher seed host in the quarterfinals.

Failing to pass by a slim 186-182 margin was a proposal to eliminate a bonus power rating point to district champions in basketball.

A proposal by Teurlings Catholic principal Mike Boyer that would have cut in half the number of non-faculty coaches at single-sex schools, such as the majority of Catholic high schools in the New Orleans area, was withdrawn.