Chicago Public Schools confirmed the new boys basketball conference alignment on Wednesday.
The Red Division technically has increased from 20 to 24 teams, but instead of a geographical division between two Red conferences, they appear to be separated by the perceived quality of the teams.
The top conference is the Red Shield: Clark, Curie, Hyde Park, Kenwood, Lane, Lincoln Park, Lindblom, Phillips, Simeon, Taft, Westinghouse and Young.
The Red Star conference includes Ag. Science, Bogan, Carver, Crane, Dyett, Englewood, Farragut, Northside, North Lawndale, Payton, Perspectives-Leadership and Marshall.
The eight White and Blue conferences remain geographically divided into Central, North, South and West.
All 24 Red conference teams will take part in the Red city playoffs. No White conference teams will be in the single elimination tournament.
The top four teams in the Red Shield according to conference record will receive the top seeds. The top four teams in the Red Star will receive seeds five through eight. The remaining teams in the the Red Shield will be seeded nine through 16 and the remaining in the Red Star will be seeded 17 through 24.
The Public League playoffs begin on Feb. 4 and the championship game is on Feb. 15.
There is no word yet on if teams will be promoted and relegated after this season.
Reaction to the new conferences has been mixed. A majority of coaches the Sun-Times spoke with said they were against the change.
“I’m not a big fan of it because of the travel,” Oliver said. “And I don’t think the playoffs are as exciting if we are just playing the same teams over and over. We will play them in conference, in the city playoffs and in the state tournament.”
Young coach Tyrone Slaughter isn’t worried about the travel issue and likes the change overall.
“The travel argument is akin to the shot clock argument,” Slaughter said. “Any time there is the slightest degree of inconvenience, it becomes a problem. It’s not that dramatically different. There are longer distances, but you see teams travel 40 miles for games in the state playoffs. The world does not come to an end. It’s a pain worth tolerating for the excitement and quality of basketball in the conference.”