MAC releases updated football schedule

The Indians have their new football schedule.

All that is needed now is approval from the governor.

The Midwest Athletic Conference on Monday released its new schedule based on the OHSAA’s announcement Friday the football calendar will be reduced to six regular-season games and an all-inclusive playoff format.

“Due to the recent changes implemented for football by the Ohio High School Athletic Association for the 2020 football season, which caused the cancelation of many non-conference football games in Week 1 and Week 2, the Midwest Athletic Conference is announcing changes to our member school’s football schedules,” conference commissioner Don Kemper said in a statement Monday afternoon.

However, the OHSAA’s six-game proposal and the updated MAC schedule is contingent on approval from Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine.

The MAC changes include dropping the non-conference schedules for all MAC teams in the first two weeks of the season, slated to be Aug. 28 and Sept. 4. The conference games originally scheduled for weeks seven and eight have been moved into those slots, giving MAC teams a conference-only schedule.

Fort Recovery’s new schedule is as follows:

•Aug. 28 — vs. Marion Local

•Sept. 4 — at Parkway

•Sept. 11 — at Coldwater

•Sept. 18 — vs. Anna

•Sept. 25 — at Versailles

•Oct. 2 — vs. St. Henry

•Oct. 9 — Playoffs TBD

In the all-inclusive playoff format, new regions will be determined Sept. 18. The number of playoff rounds is contingent on the number of schools that choose to enter the tournament. Coaches in each region will seed all playoff teams in the region to form a bracket (volleyball, basketball, baseball and softball already use the seeded format).

The state finals will end no later than Nov. 21.

The OHSAA built in a caveat to its proposal, however, which allows teams to play a maximum of 10 games — schools eliminated from the playoffs or those that choose not to participate in the playoffs have the option to still schedule additional games through Nov. 14.

Kemper told The Commercial Review on Monday afternoon that the originally scheduled MAC games for weeks 9 and 10 can still be honored if those respective teams have been eliminated from the playoffs. With week seven, Oct. 9, a guaranteed playoff game, should a MAC team lose that week they will be free to schedule an opponent for week eight (Oct. 16) on their own.

Kemper also confirmed there will not be a conference champion crowned for the 2020 season.

“With each team only guaranteed to play six other MAC teams and imbalances in amount of MAC teams and games played, it simply didn’t make sense to have a conference championship this year,” he said.