WIAA football playoff qualifiers and pairings announced on live show Saturday

The Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association will release the 11-player and 8-player 2023 football playoff qualifying fields and pairings during a one-hour live program on the WIAA State Tournament Network stations and streamed on the stations’ websites Oct. 14 at 10 a.m.

The network of stations includes WKOW-TV in Madison, WXOW-TV in La Crosse, WAOW-TV in Wausau and WQOW in Eau Claire. WKOW sports director Karley Marotta and Pablo Iglesias and Luke Gamble of the WKOW sports team will serve as the hosts of the show, which will feature the announcement of the playoff field and first-round match-ups for seven divisions of 11-player football and one division of 8-player football. Joining in the commentary will be lead analyst Travis Wilson of Wissports.net.

There will be 224 teams qualifying for the 11-player post-season with four playoff levels prior to the State Championship finals. The State finals will be played Nov. 16-17 at Camp Randall in Madison.

There will be 16 teams participating in the 8-player post season with three playoff levels prior to the State Championship final, which will be played Nov. 11 at Wisconsin Rapids Lincoln High School and streamed live on WIAA.TV.

Complete brackets and the Level 1 schedule of games will be available on the WIAA website immediately following the live announcement of the bracket pairings.

There are 408 football teams eligible to participate in the 2023 football playoffs; 363 are 11-player programs and 45 are 8-player programs.

The program will be produced by the WIAA State Television Network.