Playoff pods set for all seven classes in Iowa high school football

The road to the UNI-Dome is now set for all seven Iowa high school football classes, with the Iowa High School Athletic Association revealing the playoff pods Saturday morning.

This past Friday night, eight-player, Class A, 1A and 2A kicked off opening round playoff games, with those winners advancing into pods of four teams while 3A, 4A and 5A concluded a wild and crazy regular season.

Teams now know both this week’s opponent and who they will play if they are lucky enough to advance. From there, the pairings will be re-seeded for the state semifinals. 

Iowa City Liberty (5A), North Polk (4A) and Humboldt (3A) all finished as the No. 1 team in their respective classes in the Ratings Percentage Index. The RPI will be used to determine home-field advantage throughout the playoffs. 

The Lightning, still relatively new and having just moved up to 5A last year, will host Waukee in Pod A, which also features Linn-Mar at Ankeny, a dual-host site. The city of Ankeny will also host a matchup from Pod B between Iowa City High and Ankeny Centennial.

West Des Moines Dowling and Cedar Falls is the other Pod B contest. 

Pod C features Bettendorf hosting Iowa City West and defending state champion Southeast Polk heading to Pleasant Valley. In Pod D, Sioux City East travels to West Des Moines Valley and Waterloo West is at Johnston.

North Polk hosts Fort Dodge in 4A’s Pod A, with Cedar Rapids Xavier at Norwalk. Decorah welcomes Newton and North Scott entertains Western Dubuque in Pod B. Rounding out the class will be Clear Creek-Amana at Pella and Waverly Shell-Rock at Gilbert; while Ballard is at defending state champ Lewis Central and ADM heads to Spencer.

In 3A, Humboldt gets a rematch in Pod A with North Central Conference and district rival Clear Lake, as the winner gets either Solon or Benton. MOC-Floyd Valley at Sergeant Bluff-Luton and Bishop Heelan at Nevada completes Pod B; Davenport Assumption and Dubuque Wahlert and Williamsburg at Independence is Pod C; and Harlan at Algona and Carroll at Mount Vernon makes up Pod D.

The 2A matchups are as follows: Pod A is Western Christian at West Lyon and Central Lyon/George-Little Rock at Carroll Kuemper; Pod B is Greene County at Monroe-PCM and Mediapolis at Mid-Prairie; Pod C is Osage at Spirit Lake and Crestwood at North Fayette Valley; and Pod D is West Marshall at defending champ Van Meter and West Burlington, Notre Dame at Anamosa.

The 1A pairings are West Branch at Grundy Center and Sumner-Fredericksburg at Manson Northwest Webster in Pod A; South Hamilton at Dike-New Hartford and Emmetsburg at South Hardin in Pod B; Hinton at OABCIG and Underwood at Treynor in Pod C; and Iowa City Regina at Woodward-Granger and MFL MarMac at Wilton in Pod D.

For A, MMCRU is at West Hancock and Woodbury Central heads to Le Mars Gehlen for Pod A; Mount Ayr is at ACGC and Riverside at Tri-Center for Pod B; Saint Ansgar makes the trip to Wapsie Valley and Nashua-Plainfield is at Maquoketa Valley for Pod C; and Lisbon hosts Bellevue while Madrid welcomes Pekin for Pod D.

The eight-man pods are as follows: Ar-We-Va at Lenox and Bedford at Montezuma for A; Riceville at defending champ Bishop Garrigan and Janesville at Edgewood-Colesburg for B; WACO at Don Bosco and Iowa Valley at Galdbrook-Reinbeck for C; and CAM at Remsen St. Mary’s and Woodbine at Audubon for D.

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