We have just over two weeks to go until the first whistle is blown in the 2025 New Jersey high school football season.

As we do every offseason, it’s time to refresh you on Strength Index (SI) and Opponents’ Strength Index (OSI). Those two terms are thrown around every fall on the Garden State gridiron and when the postseason comes around, that’s when both matter most.

Head-to-head outcome is the first tiebreaker when determining playoff seeding, but OSI is the next most important metric and it has been that way since the NJSIAA changed its playoff formula five years ago.

How are OSI ratings calculated?

A team’s OSI rating is essentially a strength of schedule ranking. It counts for 60 percent of a team’s United Power Ranking (how teams are ranked for the postseason). The other 40 perc

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