What factors go into MaxPreps, FHSAA high school football rankings?
The Florida High School Athletic Association's football power rankings have been a hot topic since the organization released its first drop on Sept. 26.
A second set that was released on Tuesday looked a little less questionable. Still, there were enough wild changes that carried on the queries of how rankings are calculated.
FHSAA public relations specialist Ryan Harrison told The Palm Beach Post, "FHSAA Power Rankings are rankings that are generated by MaxPreps."
Harrison explained that the actual formula for the rankings is proprietary information owned by MaxPreps. In turn, the service does not release that information "to anyone," including the FHSAA, and therefore the FHSAA was unable to provide "specifics on the formula breakdown."
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What do we know about MaxPreps rankings?
In a post from August 2020, MaxPreps didn't go into detail on how different factors are weighted but explained what went into rankings for football teams around the state and country. National rankings are projections based on MaxPreps staff writers, whereas state rankings don't take staff input into consideration, or that of any "coaches, sportswriters, or fans." Prior season history, school size and comments on message boards aren't looked at either.
"The system utilizes the huge number of game results stored in the MaxPreps database," the article states. Understandably, more wins mean a high ranking. Yet, MaxPreps says its "system" accounts for "quality wins (against other highly ranked opponents)" and strength of schedule, noting that playoff wins are "weighted higher" than regular-season games.
What do we know about the FHSAA rankings? What do they tell us about those for MaxPreps?
"However, the Florida Power Rankings are a modified version of the MaxPreps ranking posted on their site," Harrison added.
The "Florida Power Rankings" exclude margins of victory and preseason results, but include forfeitures, per Harrison, who stated that MaxPreps calculates "both the margin of victory and the preseason games and eliminates all forfeitures from the formula."
"What the formula for the rankings is actually doing is looking at a team’s strength of schedule, their opponent’s strength of schedule, those team’s opponent strength of schedule, their opponents opponent’s strength of schedule, their opponent's opponent's opponent’s strength of schedule, and so on until infinity," Harrison said.
The formula counts "an infinite amount of data points," which generates the scores and rankings that teams wait to see week after week.
No room for error, but there's a chance
As a site driven by the participation of coaches, staff members, parents and fans, MaxPreps admits that its rankings could be affected by "incomplete or inaccurate information."
The MaxPreps post reads: "We will correct errors when they are reported to us. If we are missing a score, report it to us on the team's MaxPreps page. If we are missing a game on the schedule, send us a correction request."
However, there's no explanation for what happens if errors go unreported, which could've been the case for Buchholz, the FHSAA's No. 3-ranked program in the state. The returning state semifinalists went unlisted on MaxPreps — even in Class 4S — as of last Thursday. MaxPreps has since resolved the issue and the site lists the Bobcats as No. 10 in Florida.
Given that end-of-season ranks help determine playoff contention and hosting duties, errors that go unnoticed now could be detrimental when the postseason arrives in November.
Emilee Smarr is the high school sports reporter for The Palm Beach Post. She can be reached via email at esmarr@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: MaxPreps, FHSAA high school football rankings: What are the factors?
