Illinois Valley playoff picture: La Salle-Peru, Dwight, Fieldcrest, Bureau Valley trying to win their way in

Seneca, Amboy-LaMoille, Princeton, Marquette and FCW have locked up playoff spots, and a number of other NewsTribune and Times area football teams are still alive and trying to win their way in Friday. Here’s a look at the playoff picture for local teams still alive in the playoff hunt.

IN

8-0 teams

Seneca (32 playoff points)

The Fighting Irish are in via both their eight wins and by winning the inaugural championship of the Chicagoland Prairie League it clinched with wins the past two weeks over Marquette and Dwight/Gardner-South Wilmington. Week 9′s home game against St. Bede won’t change any of that but would guarantee Seneca a top seed in the Class 2A or 3A field, whichever the Irish end up in.

Amboy-LaMoille (35 playoff points)

The Illinois 8-Man Football Association in general follows the IHSA’s playoff qualifications, although with no automatic conference championship bids. It’s no matter for the Clippers, who with eight wins and as one of only two remaining undefeated teams are guaranteed a spot and a high seed. Amboy-LaMoille closes the regular season at home against Polo.

7-1 teams

Princeton (37 playoff points)

The Tigers have clinched the automatic bid awarded to the Three Rivers Mississippi, although they’d be in with room to spare anyway with their seven victories. Princeton will take its six-game winning streak into its Week 9 regular-season finale against Hall and will be making its fifth straight postseason appearance – most likely with a first-round home game – in the Class 3A field.

6-2 teams

Marquette (33 playoff points)

The possibility of hosting a first-round playoff game in the Class 1A field will be on the line with Friday’s visit to Dwight, although even with a win the Crusaders might find themselves on the road in Week 10. This will be Marquette’s 11th consecutive season in the 1A playoff field after a 10-year drought between 2002 and 2011.

Flanagan-Cornell/Woodland (34 playoff points)

With six wins playing an eight-man schedule, FCW is on the I8FA bracket regardless of the outcome of Friday night’s visit to 2-5 Farmer City. A win, however, seems likely to lock up a Week 10 home playoff game for the Falcons, whose only two losses are close ones to a pair of teams (St. Thomas More and Milford-Cissna Park) with a combined 14-2 record.

STILL ELIGIBLE

5-3 teams

St. Bede (36 playoff points)

The Bruins look to be in good shape to grab an at-large bid regardless of whether they can upset undefeated Seneca in Week 9 or not. That’s thanks to SBA’s respectable 36 playoff points with a guaranteed floor of 40 if St. Bede does finish 5-4. Last season all 5-4 teams qualified, and the season before the cutoff came in at 34 playoff points. The Bruins have been a Class 1A, 2A and 3A qualifier in the past decade but seem likeliest to be in 1A for the third straight season and on the road in Week 10.

Sandwich (34 playoff points)

One of the feel-good stories of the 2023 season after not fielding a varsity team in 2022, the Indians, thanks to their playoff point total with a guaranteed four more to come if they finish 5-4, seem like a good bet to return to the postseason for the first time since a Class 4A appearance in 2013. The Indians can lock up a spot – almost certainly in 4A – with a win Friday at 2-5 Woodstock North.

Dwight/GSW (31 playoff points)

The Trojans are in a bit of a precarious position, needing either a home win over 6-2 Marquette on Friday or a forgiving playoff point cutoff for 5-4 at-large bids. It was routinely higher than that pre-COVID-19, however. Dwight/Gardner-South Wilmington seems likely to finish with 35 playoff points if it does finish 5-4. The good news is, Friday Night Drive expert Steve Soucie’s late-season projections point to that number being enough to get the Trojans into the Class 2A or, less likely, 3A field.

4-4 teams

La Salle-Peru (41 playoff points)

The Cavaliers have done everything they were supposed to do to qualify for the Class 5A field as an at-large, 5-4 team for the fourth season in a row except for one blip – Week 6′s 17-14 upset at the hands of currently 2-6 Woodstock. That defeat has left L-P likely needing to pull off an upset of its own Friday at Howard Fellows Stadium over 5-3 Kaneland, a team whose three losses have come by a combined 17 points to teams (Washington, Morris, Sycamore) with a combined 23-1 record. There are projections that have multiple 4-5 teams earning at-large bids, and the Cavaliers seem likely to wind up in the high-40s in playoff points if they do lose, but it seems a long shot that would be enough. Last year’s lone 4-5 to get in, Buffalo Grove, had 56 playoff points.

Bureau Valley (41 playoff points)

Pretty much everything written above for La Salle-Peru could be copied and pasted here for the Storm in terms of their playoff possibilities. Bureau Valley won big over Aurora Central Catholic to stay alive but almost certainly needs to upset 7-1 Morrison this week in order to get an at-large bid and make the postseason for the first time since joining the Class 1A field in 2016. There have been late-season projections forecasting more than one 4-5 team could make it this year. Bureau Valley’s playoff point total seems likely to wind up in the mid-40s.

Fieldcrest (40 playoff points)

The Knights are in pretty much the same situation as aforementioned La Salle-Peru and Bureau Valley. The surest path for Fieldcrest is to pull off a road upset Friday against 7-1 LeRoy. Barring that, there is a narrow path for Fieldcrest to get into the postseason for the first time since 2019, but it would require garnering a rare at-large bid for a 4-5 team and for the required number of playoff points for that at-large bid to wind up in the mid-40s, which is where the Knights’ total is likely to wind up. Like Bureau Valley and L-P – perhaps even more so than them – it’s almost certainly a win-to-get-in, lose-and-go-home scenario for Fieldcrest.