Opening Drive (Nov. 12): Keeping home-field advantage

One quirk of the TSSAA playoffs is that the quarterfinal and semifinal rounds don’t necessarily give home-field advantage to the top-seeded teams.

The quarterfinal round in Division I — which is slated for next week — is the most affected by that rule. In even-numbered years (such as this one), teams on the bottom of the bracket in the third round will host, unless they’re from the same region. Then it reverts back to the higher-seeded team.

In the Division I semifinals, the bottom team in each half of the bracket is the home team with no exceptions. What this means is that the Region 4 and Region 8 champions could have home field throughout the postseason. (This year, there are a couple of cases where Region 8 teams aren’t playing, which means the Region 7 teams could have that carrot to play for in the playoffs.)

So who’s playing for home-field advantage next week?

Gordonsville could have it all the way through the semifinals in Class 1A as the Region 4 champion. Watertown could do the same in Class 2A. Northeast could conceivably do it in Class 5A, but that would require a Henry County loss this week. Hendersonville has that road in Class 6A from Region 4.

Every other area team in Division I has the possibility of another road game if things fall a certain way. Stay tuned.

Meanwhile, catch up on what you might have missed from Wednesday: