2024 IHSA football schedule release: Schools get inventive to fill slates

The nature of the IHSA football playoff system requires teams to dive right in.

With playoff qualification hinging on a team’s ability to reach a certain number of wins, there are very few teams that can afford the luxury of easing into the regular season.

The conference landscape saw some alterations once again, placing significant strain on some programs to fill their nonconference games.

Almost all 495 playoff-eligible programs managed to fill their nine-game schedule, needing 56 out-of-state programs to do it, but more significantly those schedule needs facilitated some early-season nonconference whoppers to kick things off.

Just like last season, elite programs had difficulty finding opponents to fill out their nonconference dates, particularly in the CCL/ESCC, and in the end many had to resolve to squaring off with fellow powerhouses to get the job done.

And although that might mean trouble for the bottom-line win total for some programs, it insures that high school football fans are going to get some marquee matchups right from the get-go.

Last season’s opening event between East St. Louis and Mount Carmel at Illinois State University certainly kicked off Week 1 in style last season, and while that particular game will not be rekindled in 2024, the game’s showcase experience will be renewed as Loyola takes the place of Mount Carmel as a highlight of what appears to be a robust Week 1 offering.

Mount Carmel, while not involved in that game, took an interesting path to filling that schedule vacancy. The Caravan will play The Hun School out of Princeton, New Jersey, in its opener, and if fans are looking to get a jump start on the 2024 season that game will be held on the first available day to play high school games in Illinois: Thursday, Aug. 29.

The Caravan aren’t the only school that had to look outside of the state’s borders for a willing week 1 opponent as 13 schools are playing out-of-state opponents to begin their season. That list includes Joliet Catholic squaring off with Iowa City and Sacred Heart Griffin challenging Christian Brothers (Missouri).

Other intriguing games with out-of-state opponents come late. Lincoln-Way East is making a rare foray into playing an out-of-state opponent as it will challenge Speciality Fit from Dover, Florida, at the East St. Louis Jamboree in Week 2. Speciality Fit lost to national powerhouse IMG Academy in a state final last season. IMG, meanwhile, will play East St. Louis in Week 9.

Here’s a breakdown of where out-of-state opponents come from:

Those that are confined just to the borders of the state of Illinois also managed to piece together some intriguing in-state matchups to kick off the year such as Kenwood/St. Francis; Kankakee/Nazareth; Maine South/Lincoln-Way East; Hope Academy/Wilmington; Batavia/Glenbard West; Hersey/Warren; and Rochester/Simeon.

Riverton and Vienna recently announced that they are stepping out of the varsity football ranks for at least the 2024 season. Prior to that the Oblong/Palestine/Hutsonville co-op also indicated it was also leaving 11-man football and breaking apart to form two different 8-man entrants. West Carroll also did the same, moving into the 8-man ranks as well. These moves leave the state currently with 495 playoff eligible teams.

That’s still three higher than last year’s all-time low of 492, but there is a bit of a wiggle room in that actual number. 24 of those 495 teams are involved in divisions (White Tier 2 conferences) in the Chicago Public League where only the winner of a one of four, six-team divisions will be awarded a playoff berth.

Fifty-four CPL teams are technically eligible for the playoffs, but those really mean there are only 34 teams realistically eligible for playoff consideration. It’s mathematically impossible for the CPL to qualify all 34 of those teams as eligible, and it seems like 20 would be the top end of the spectrum on CPL qualifiers in this system and would likely end up with less. 26 CPL teams qualified last season.

That likely means that the door will be open wider for four-win teams to qualify as at-large playoff teams in the field of 256-team qualifiers. Six teams made the field last year as four-win teams, including Nazareth who became the first school in state history to win a title (Class 5A) with five losses.

Eight schools were unable to fill all nine of their schedule slots (one school, Westmont, has three schedule vacancies).

The ranks of 8-man football has 30 programs scheduled to compete. 28 teams at least attempted to start the season last year with two programs experiencing multiple forfeits. 27 of those 28 have declared that they plan to return to play with Peoria Quest dropping out for this year. Three new teams that have moved from 11-man football (Oblong, Palestine/Hutsonville and West Carroll) account for the additions.