An unofficial look at where every Big Central playoff contender stands heading into Week 8

The official numbers are expected to be released later today by Gridiron New Jersey – or at least by Tuesday at noon, per NJSIAA rules, as long as more teams don’t report their scores wrong this week (read more here) – but Central Jersey Sports Radio has early projections on how the Big Central teams stand in the chase for the playoffs.

Without getting into the numerical details, since we usually check our numbers with Gridiron – the NJSIAA’s official calculator of the playoff formula – we can at least give a sense who’s in, who’s likely to get in, and who’s on the proverbial playoff bubble.

Heading into Week 8, we project 21 teams have clinched a playoff berth. They include:

• North 5: Phillipsburg, Watchung Hills, Westfield, Piscataway, Bridgewater
• South 5: North Brunswick, Hillsborough, Edison
• North 4: North Hunterdon, Ridge, Colonia, Montgomery, Rahway
• North 3: Hillside, Cranford
• South 3: South Plainfield
• North 2: Bernards
• South 2: New Providence, Delaware Valley
• North 1: Brearley
• South 1: Manville

Of those teams, Phillipsburg, North Brunswick and North Hunterdon all are tops in their respective supersections, and should earn a top seed. Hillsborough may have a chance in South 5, but we think they would need all three of the following things to happen in order to finish second, and get the other top seed: They need to win at Westfield Saturday afternoon, a Toms River North loss at Middletown North Friday night, and a Lenape loss at St. Augustine Friday night.

The following have not yet wrapped up a playoff berth, but we think they have a good chance to make the field of 16:

• North 5: Union
• North 3: Summit
• South 2: Johnson
• South 1: South Hunterdon

The following are considered bubble teams, defined as the last three in or the first three out, if the regular season were over today (i.e., the current teams in 14th through 19th place that are not already mathematically eliminated):

• South 5: South Brunswick, Hunterdon Central, Old Bridge
• North 4: Sayreville, Woodbridge, Linden
• South 3: Carteret, Somerville
• South 1: Middlesex

That’s a total of 34 Big Central public schools either in the playoffs or in contention for a spot. Last year, 31 public schools made it, in addition to St. Thomas Aquinas, while St. Joseph-Metuchen opted out.

Predictions will be a little easier this week, by design, since Strength index values lock in and do not change based on the outcome of this coming weekend’s games. Those numbers, however, will be computed behind the scenes and include all postseason and regular season games through the end of the year, in order to have accurate numbers to recenter and start 2023 with.

Official seeding and playoff pairings are expected to be announced next Sunday, but before that, on Saturday night at approximately 6 pm, Central Jersey Sports Radio will have its annual projection show, hosted live by Mike Pavlichko, with our unofficial projections of the playoff matchups in all public school sections. Click here to listen.

The cutoff for non-public schools is the following week, and Groups A and B are seeded by committee, with power points, OSI and UPR standings taken into consideration by the seeding committee.

This will be the first year of the NJSIAA’s expanded playoffs, allowing for Group Champions to be crowned for the first time ever. All sectional games will be at higher seeds. North 1 vs. North 2 group semifinals will be held at Franklin, while South vs. Central group semis will be at Cherokee.

The Group Finals will be at Rutgers the first weekend of December.