OSAA should consider a true ‘Open’ football championship bracket in Oregon … here’s how it could look

Arizona is one state that puts the best teams from 6A, 5A and 4A together in one field to compete for the ultimate state title

Class 4A power Marist Catholic would get an opportunity to compete against the state's best 5A and 6A teams in a true Open Division playoff. / Photo by Leon Neuschwander

The Oregon School Activities Association has changed the Class 6A football playoff format twice in the past five years.

First, it split the 32-team bracket in two, with the upper half playing for the state championship and the bottom half in the Columbia Cup, a tournament set up to give teams that traditionally do not contend for a title an opportunity to win a trophy.

Then, last summer, the OSAA adopted another set of changes. It reduced the upper bracket from 16 to 12 teams and renamed it the 6A Open Championship, with the remaining 16 teams in the lower bracket playing in the 6A Championship.

But calling the upper bracket an Open division is a misnomer. It’s not truly open to any team in the state, but only to Class 6A teams. 

Moreover, it’s more like the Masters Tournament in golf — a team can earn entry to the field via winning a league title (like the Masters policy of inviting full-field PGA tournament winners) or finishing high enough in the OSAA rankings (like the Masters policy of inviting the top 50 in the Official World Golf Ranking).

But why limit the Open field to just 6A teams? Why not have a true Open Division state championship like Arizona holds every year in which every team in the state’s top three classifications could qualify? Then, each classification has a state championship bracket with teams that do not make the Open field — just like the opposite-field PGA Tour events allow golfers who don’t qualify for signature events the chance at a PGA Tour title.

When Arizona began its Open championship in 2019, the concerns were twofold:

- Would it water down the big-school tournament?

- Would smaller schools want to participate?

Saguaro, which was then an Arizona 4A powerhouse, answered the latter question emphatically when then-coach Jason Mohns told the Arizona Republic, "It means everything to our team. Getting to the Open Division playoffs was the goal from the day it was announced. Now we want to make a run.”

An Open Division berth would become like an NCAA Tournament berth for a mid-major program — something to strive for as a status symbol and a chance to knock off one of the big boys. And if they can pull a run like Butler’s in 2010 and 2011 to reach the final? All the better.

As for the first question, didn’t bifurcating the 6A bracket already water down the meaning of the second-tier tournament? Now, instead of being the also-ran 6A tournament, it would be the 6A championship.

So, what would a true Open Division championship look like this year?

SBLive Oregon used the two ranking systems the OSAA uses for its official rankings (Colley and RPI) and added each team’s point totals, then applied the multiplier that Arizona uses (10 for 6A teams, 9 for 5A teams, 8 for 4A teams) to determine the field for a hypothetical 12-team Open Division championship:

1. Lake Oswego (6A) 17,657.78 points

2. West Linn (6A) 16,660.67

3. Sheldon (6A) 15,573.90

4. Silverton (5A) 15,276.81

5. Lakeridge (6A) 15,080.36

6. Central Catholic (6A) 15,013.54

7. Mountain View (5A) 14,590.37

8. Sprague (6A) 14,526.01

9. Dallas (5A) 13,916.13

10. Marist Catholic (4A) 13,580.71

11. Sherwood (6A) 13,557.65

12. Tualatin (6A) 13,431.40

Just missed

13. Churchill (5A) 13,358.79

14. Wilsonville (5A) 13,272.80

15. Nelson (6A) 13,100.00

Critics might say, wait a minute, there’s no way Marist Catholic could compete in this tournament. Of course, they said the same thing about Oakland and James Madison in last season’s NCAA Tournament — until they pulled first-round upsets.

The first-round matchups in a 12-team field would look like this:

No. 12 Tualatin at No. 5 Lakeridge

No. 11 Sherwood at No. 6 Central Catholic

No. 10 Marist Catholic at No. 7 Mountain View

No. 9 Dallas at No. 8 Sprague

Assuming all the higher seeds won — or, if we wanted to follow the Arizona model of an eight-team Open tournament — you’d get these quarterfinals:

No. 8 Sprague at No. 1 Lake Oswego

No. 7 Mountain View at No. 2 West Linn

No. 6 Central Catholic at No. 3 Sheldon

No. 5 Lakeridge at No. 4 Silverton

Silverton and Mountain View are the two most complete teams in 5A this year and would not be pushovers in this bracket. Central Catholic-Sheldon would be an exciting matchup that would feature two of the state’s best players in seniors Landon Kelsey for the Rams and Mana Tuioti for the Irish.

A true Open Division would allow the state’s best programs to shine on an even bigger stage while providing a goal for everyone in the top three classifications to strive to achieve.

Just like a Masters invite.

And an NCAA Tournament bid.

It’s time for the OSAA to make it happen.

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