The Indiana High School Athletic Association announced new sectional assignments in football, boys and girls basketball and boys and girls soccer this week.

In football, the Giants will play in Sectional 6 the next two years along with Tech, Southport and Perry Meridian. This ends a two-year sectional rotation that had us playing with Warren Central, Lawrence North and Lawrence Central.

“The new sectional alignment creates some challenges for our program,” football coach Jason Simmons said. “All three programs in the sectional are teams we do not see during the regular season.

“That lack of familiarity creates some concerns on a short prep that you run into during the tournament. We have some knowledge of Tech playing them at the varsity and JV level in 2018, however we know very little about Southport and Perry. We feel good that our regular season schedule will have us prepared for the tournament.”

Tech is being replaced with Brownsburg in our season-opening game this coming season.

The new alignment also means Ben Davis will not have to play both Center Grove and Warren Central during the state tournament as we did during the 2014 season. Should BD win sectionals, the regional opponent would be either Pike, Zionsville, Avon or Brownsburg and a possible semistate opponent could be either Center Grove or Warren Central.

The boys basketball and girls basketball sectional alignment remains the same with Southport, Pike, Decatur Central, Perry Meridian and Roncalli as possible opponents. Boys soccer and girls also did not change but volleyball is now in a sectional that includes Tech, Attucks, Pike, Perry Meridian, Roncalli and Southport.

All the new sectional assignments can be found at http://www.ihsaa.org/Portals/0/ihsaa/documents/news%20media/2018-19/042919SectionalAssignments.pdf.

The IHSAA also announced that football will adopt a mercy rule next season that states when a team has a 35-point or more lead in the second half of games the clock will not stop except for timeouts, injuries and scores.

“The mercy rule was something that was needed across the state of Indiana,” Simmons said. “The rule allows for teams to protect their players, exercise sportsmanship, and protect the game of football. Football had an agreement that was in place, but it was not concrete. The consistency takes the decision out of the hands of the coaches administrators, and officials. It will not deter from football in the State of Indiana.”