Steve Soucie’s Week 4 playoff projection: Relatively calm week still leads to bracket shake-ups

Even though there was relatively little volatility in the Week 4 results even a few small things can cause havoc in an attempt to project the IHSA playoff field.

That was the lesson I already knew but apparently needed reminding of when putting together this week’s projection.

Just 15 new or returning teams were inserted into the projection this week, but the most important thing about that was where those teams fell on the enrollment board.

This, coupled with the fact that the number of needed 4-win teams to fill the field jumped up a few teams to nine and all but two of those at-large qualifiers are in classes larger than 4A that led to a classification switch for several schools on the bubble.

One of those projected 4-5 at-large qualifiers, Glenbard West, moved from 8A to 7A to make room for one of the other projected 4-5 qualifiers, Oswego East.

Those moves sparked another more expansive shift to the outlook in Class 6A where several notable teams including Quincy, now projects as the No. 1 seed in the southern side of the Class 6A bracket and the entire side of that bracket looks substantially different than it did a week ago.

Then there was volatility in several conferences. Not surprisingly, the Chicago Public League led to several of the team switches as a number of close games caused a re-evaluation of several CPL teams. That will likely continue all season.

Other conferences provided interesting challenges most notably the Kishwaukee River Conference. Woodstock North has broken free from the pack with a 4-0 record, but a whopping six teams (Sandwich, Johnsburg, Marengo, Richmond-Burton, Woodstock and Harvard) all sit at 2-2 with already some conflicting results emerging as to establishing what the league’s true pecking order might be.

It’s possible that this will work itself out the remaining five weeks of the season and a clear pecking order will be established. Or utter chaos might rule where the league produced five or six bids when ordinarily there should have been 3 or 4. Or it could go the other way with no clear leader emerging and teams all fighting to simply get to the five-win plateau.

Here is the Week 4 playoff projection for all eight classes (below each bracket is more context on what happened in Week 4 that changed the make-up of the brackets):

Class 1A

Class 1A Enrollment Range: Up to 304.5 (Bloomington Central Catholic)

New teams in field:

Class 2A

Class 2A Enrollment Range: 307 (Momence) to 412 (Carlinville)

New teams in field:

Class 3A

Class 3A Enrollment Range: 415.5 (Paxton) to 561.5 (South Shore)

New teams in field:

Class 4A

Class 4A Enrollment Range: 563.5 (Peoria Notre Dame) to 848 (Morris)

New teams in field:

Class 5A

Class 5A Enrollment Range: 851.5 (Centralia) to 1326.5 (Kaneland)

New teams in field:

Class 6A

Class 6A Enrollment Range: 1340.5 (Dunlap) to 1877.5 (Bradley-Bourbonnais)

New teams in field:

Class 7A

Class 7A Enrollment Range: 1877.5 (Argo) to 2322 (Glenbard West)

New teams in field:

Class 8A

Class 8A Enrollment Range: 2351.5 (Plainfield North) and up

New teams in field: