BILLINGS — For years, Class A football teams played a large portion of their playoff games on Saturdays — even though the classification, like most of the state, plays the majority of its regular-season games on Friday nights.
But this past summer, Class A athletic directors and administrators voted overwhelmingly to change the so-called "default" day for its football postseason from Saturday at 1 p.m. to Friday at 7, meaning we're likely to see a lot more Friday night playoff games in the coming weeks.
According to Hamilton AD Travis Blome, the proposal passed by a 23-1 vote.
Related: 2025 Class A football playoff pairings
"We've gone back and forth in Class A having a lot of different discussions about the playoffs and different dates," Blome told MTN Sports. "You're seeing more and more conflicts that arise sometimes on Saturdays.
"What it really does now is eliminate a lot of those issues that can happen in certain communities where it's like, 'We can't play Saturday at 1.' You won't get as many conflicts a lot of times on Friday night. And everyone can play Friday night at 7 because that's what we've done. So it just makes that fall-back a little bit easier."
A default day is in place for the playoffs in the event that two teams cannot agree on when to schedule a postseason contest. For instance, if one team prefers to play Friday and the other wants to play Saturday, it will now automatically fall to Friday night.
Blome said first-round defaults for the Class A playoffs have been set for Friday for the past two years, but this is the first time it will be in place for the entire postseason. That doesn't mean teams cannot schedule head-to-head playoff matchups for Saturdays, they just have to mutually agree to do so.
"ADs, just like in the past, can work together to figure out the best game time," Blome said. "But if they can't come up with an agreement then the default is Friday at 7."
Blome added: "The kids are used to playing Friday night at 7. Friday Night Lights — big crowds. The cons, you know, we've been playing (the playoffs) on Saturdays at 1 forever. I think it's just kind of an adjustment period. We'll see how it goes."
One program for which the change makes logical sense is defending state champion Billings Central, which plays its home games at Herb Klindt Field on the campus of Rocky Mountain College.
That circumstance makes it difficult to play home playoff games on Saturdays because the Rams are at the mercy of the Battlin' Bears' home football schedule.
Central has played Friday night playoff games at home in the recent past, so it's not too big of a change. But it's in the team's best interests.
"We always prefer Friday night," said 24th-year Rams coach Jim Stanton. "That's when we play, and that stays on our same routine and the same schedule in terms of your preparation. The consistency of continuing to play Friday night has been what we've always wanted to do."
The 2025 Class A playoffs kick off this Friday with four first-round games, all scheduled for 7 p.m. — Butte Central at Whitefish, Lewistown at Sidney, Glendive at East Helena, and Bigfork at Hamilton.
Laurel, Frenchtown, Columbia Falls and Billings Central have first-round byes into the quarterfinals, and those games right now are all scheduled for Friday, Nov. 7 at 7 p.m.
The semifinals are defaulting to Friday, Nov. 14 while the championship is Friday, Nov. 21.
The Class A state championship game has for years taken place on Saturday afternoon, so that will be a significant change provided it defaults to Friday this year.
"I can't remember," Blome said when asked of the last time Class A played its title game on a Friday night. "I don't know if it ever has. So yeah, it's definitely a change.
"What I'm looking at this week, all the games are at 7 Friday night. I think you'll see next week in the quarterfinals, all of them will be Friday at 7. I think it gives us a good chance to see some great football."
