Fall sports have officially begun!
And if you’ve followed the Northern 10 over the last decade, you’ll be in for something new this year with six new schools joining the conference.
Hopewell-Loudon, Lucas, New Riegel, Old Fort, Tiffin Calvert, and Willard join Buckeye Central, Bucyrus, Carey, Colonel Crawford, Mohawk, Seneca East, Upper Sandusky, and Wynford to form a 14-school league.
The Northern 10 will be split into two divisions to start:
Each sport will operate in a different way; here’s how golf, volleyball, football, and cross country will function with regards to inter-league contests.
Golf
Three 18-hole tournaments throughout the season will determine the standings and ultimately crown a champion in the inaugural season of expansion.
The first will be held at Clinton Heights Golf Course in Tiffin representing the East — girls on July 31, boys on August 6 — the second will be at Loudon Meadows Golf Club in Fostoria representing the West Division — boys on August 11, girls on August 14.
The third and final tournament will be at Woody Ridge Golf Course in Shelby as a neutral site — girls September 15, boys September 16. Teams will receive one point for every team they finish ahead of at each tournament, the team with the most accumulated points at the end of the third tournament will be the conference champion.
Individual golfers will accumulate points at each tournament based on the number of golfers they finish ahead of with the final point tally determining the Northern 10 Golfer of the Year and All-Northern 10 honors.
Volleyball
Following a more traditional East and West split, teams will play each school in their respective division twice — home and away — as well as a number predetermined number of crossover matches with teams in the opposite division, but these crossover matches have no bearing on divisional standings.
The final match of the regular season will be determined based on divisional standings with No. 1 in the East playing No. 1 in the West, No. 2 in the East vs. No. 2 in the West, etc. on an alternating basis for location — West will host this season, East next season, etc.
League matches will be on Tuesday and Thursday nights, and Saturday mornings as needed. Weekday freshman matches will begin at 5 p.m., JV and varsity following exactly 20 minutes after the conclusion of the preceding match. If no freshman game, JV will start at 5:30 p.m.; Saturday contests will start at 10 a.m.
If necessary, tiebreakers to determine divisional seeding will be: (A) head-to-head match record, (B) head-to-head set record, (C) match record vs. next highest placed team, (D) set record vs. next highest placed team, (E) downward continuation, (F) RPI ranking.
Football
Operating on a competitive balance model, each team will play an eight-game conference schedule with two non-league games to start the season. The conference schedules will operate on a two-year basis with one home game and one away before competitive balance is recalculated.
Teams are ranked 1-through-12 based on their conference record over the last two years — for the initial calculations, overall record for the last four years was used — and once ranked, are divided into four tiers:
To maintain scheduling equality and competitiveness, a Tier 1 team will only play one Tier 4 team over a two-year rotation. After determining the Tier 1 vs. Tier 4 matchups, the remainder of the schedule is randomly generated and adjusted to balance home and away.
The league champion(s) will be determined based on overall conference record after Week 10.
Cross Country
The easiest one to follow — nothing changes. Schools will race throughout the regular season the same way they always have and meet at Seneca East High School on October 17th for the Northern 10 Championship.
zholden@gannett.com | 419-617-6018 | Twitter/X: @Zachary_Holden
This article originally appeared on Bucyrus Telegraph-Forum: Northern 10 expansion brings new format to league play in some sports
Reporting by Zachary Holden, Mansfield News Journal / Bucyrus Telegraph-Forum
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Zachary Holden, Mansfield News Journal | USA TODAY Network
