PIERRE – For 2020, postseason qualification standards have changed for volleyball and football. This was approved Monday by the SDHSAA Board of Directors during a special meeting.
This was done to accommodate students at Native American schools. At least 12 have either suspended or cancelled fall sports due to shelter-in-place restrictions on reservations.
This season, volleyball teams must now play a minimum of eight matches and football teams must play five games. However, failure to do so would not result in a team being excluded from the playoffs. Instead, for the difference in a game or match not played and the minimum, a team would be given a loss and 30 seed points, the same as losing to a team with a win percentage below .250. And, that team’s actual record would determine the opponent’s power points.
Regional alignments were also addressed. When region play begins, if a region has only two or one teams, it would be paired off with another region and form a super region. From that, four spots in the SoDak 16 would be determined. At the moment, Region 7 in Class A volleyball has only two schools participating – Bennett County and Winner.
Also, a student not able to compete in fall sports can transfer to another school and become eligible immediately. Then, that student can return to the original school following the completion of the fall sports season.
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