First look at new RPI rankings for high school football teams in South Carolina

Lou Bezjak
Sam Wolfe/Special To The State

The first high school football MaxPreps’ RPI rankings for South Carolina were released Tuesday afternoon.

From now on, the rankings will be updated after games are played on Thursday and Friday nights.

This is the first year RPI rankings will be used in South Carolina — and only for Class 5A Division I and II and Class 4A. With the decision to split Class 5A divisions, a different formula will be used to seed teams in the playoffs for all sports.

The RPI is 50% based on your winning percentage, 40% of your opponents’ winning percentage and 10% of your opponents’ opponents’ winning percentage. Margin of victory is not used to determine RPI.

Using the RPI rankings, region champions will be seeded first in the playoffs followed by second-, third- and fourth-place finishers. All non-automatic qualifiers would make up the rest of the bracket based on RPI standings.

For the Class 4A playoffs, there will be 16 teams in the upper state and 16 in the lower state. As an example, the four region champions in Upper and Lower State will be seeded 1-4 based on RPI. The same goes for second place and so on. Class 4A used 1-16 seeding the past two years but didn’t use an RPI formula.

In Class 5A Division I and II, 12 teams make the playoffs in the upper and lower state with the top four seeds in each getting byes in the first round.

With the use of RPI, there will be no predetermined home and away teams in the Class 4A and 5A playoff brackets, which most coaches are glad to see go away. The highest remaining seed will host. Because of the seeding criteria, region teams could face each other in the first round of the postseason.

Complete RPI rankings for football and all fall sports can be found at the South Carolina Administrators Association website.

SC Football RPI Rankings Top 25

Class 5A

Schools in bold are Class 5A Division I while other schools are Class 5A Division II.

1. Dutch Fork, 3-0 0.8138

2. Northwestern, 4-0 0.79063

3. Sumter, 4-0, 0.79063

4. Chapin, 4-0, 0.73542

5. Summerville, 3-0, 0.72361

6. Gaffney, 3-0, 0.72222

7. Hillcrest, 3-0, 0.68194

8. Spartanburg, 2-1, 0.68056

9. White Knoll, 2-1, 0.67708

10. Blythewood, 4-0, 0.65625

11. Dorman, 2-1, 0.65556

12. TL Hanna, 2-1, 0.65000

13. River Bluff, 4-0, 0.63802

14. JL Mann, 2-1, 0.63333

15. Irmo, 4-0, 0.63229

16. Lexington 3-1, 0.62865

17. Eastside, 3-0, 0.62083

18. Clover, 3-1, 0.62083

19. Woodmont, 1-2, 0.61806

20. Boiling Springs, 3-0, 0.61528

21. Ridge View, 1-3, 0.61094

22. Indian Land, 3-0, 0.59861

23. West Florence, 3-1, 0.59854

24. Lugoff-Elgin, 3-1, .59219

25. Riverside, 3-0, 0.57222

Class 4A

1. Westside, 3-0, 0.81111

2. Seneca, 4-0, 0.73333

3. South Florence, 2-2, 0.68958

4. Richland Northeast, 4-0, 0.67917

5. Camden, 3-1, 0.67292

6. North Augusta, 2-1, 0.65625

7. Gray Collegiate, 1-2, 0.64861

8. A.C. Flora, 3-1, 0.62188

9. South Aiken, 2-2, 0.60885

10. Bishop England, 3-0, 0.60556

11. Fountain Inn, 3-1, 0.60313

12. May River, 4-0, 0.60208

13. Crestwood, 2-2, 0.58438

14. Wren, 3-1, 0.58438

15. Dreher, 2-1, 0.57778

16. Daniel, 2-1, 0.55556

17. Lower Richland 2-2, 0.54583

18. Emerald, 2-2, 0.52708

19. South Pointe, 2-2, 0.51719

20. Gilbert, 1-2, 0.51472

21. Hartsville, 1-1-1, 0.51111

22. Lakewood, 1-3, 0.49479

23. Pickens, 2-2, 0.48958

24. Bluffton, 2-2, 0.48594

25. Berea, 2-1, 0.48194

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