Midlo - I've pasted the pertinent details from the article:
Two major changes will highlight this big realignment, which will come just four seasons after the 2013 shift from three to six state-wide classifications:
Regions—the mid-level in postseason competition—will be changed again, from two per classification back to four. That’s how classifications existed under the old three-classification alignment (AAA, AA and A).
Conferences—the local level of play since 2013—seem to be scheduled for extinction, a unanimously welcome change.
“We support the elimination of conferences,” Eastern View AD Mark Settle said. “That vehicle is not working.”
CONFERENCE CLOSED
Under the previous, three-classification alignment, districts (the Commonwealth for most Stafford County schools, and the Battlefield for most Spotsylvania schools) denoted the local level of play. They set the biggest parameter for regular-season scheduling and postseason advancement.
Conferences were introduced with the 2013 realignment—along with much confusion among schools and across sports.
Although conferences became the vehicle to advance into region tournaments, districts still existed and governed a lot of regular-season activity.
“There were a ton of people even in this school who really didn’t understand what was going on [with conferences and districts],” Washington & Lee AD Malcolm Lewis said.
Stafford schools, for instance, had an easier transition. Except for the line between Conference 4 (6A schools) and Conference 15 (5A), the Commonwealth District remained mostly intact and the five county schools played each other throughout the year, then split into their respective conferences (along with Prince William County schools) for conference tournaments.
But Orange remained a part of the Jefferson District—centered around Albemarle—while playing in a conference filled with a mashup of other 5A schools.
So the Hornets played their regular season against traditional opponents such as Western Albemarle, Louisa and Monticello, but then competed for postseason slots with schools as far flung as Halifax and both 5A Patrick Henry High Schools—one in Roanoke, and one in Ashland.
Several ADs said they thought conferences—consisting of schools partnered by enrollment numbers—could work fine, and they knew from past experience that geographical districts worked, too. What didn’t work was the combination, with schools serving two masters at the local level.
“I’m in love with the idea of the same-size schools competing with each other,” King George AD Alex Fisher said. “I think that’s great. We’ve got no problem with six classifications.
“But it needed to be a commitment. As long as we were clinging to districts, too, I don’t think it was going to work.”
EVERYONE TO REGIONS
The biggest change which seems to be coming is an all-in approach to region play.
Schools will continue to play regular seasons in mostly geographically structured districts. But each classification will be divided into four regions, with every team (eight to 12 per region) advancing to the first round of a region tournament.
It would essentially eliminate district or conference play as a key factor in the postseason. A state quarterfinal game would return in most sports.
Under the current alignment—with two regions per classification—the top two region finishers advance to state semifinals. But with four regions per classification, each region can advance two teams, forming an eight-team state tournament.
Chancellor AD Rod Crooks, who coached volleyball for nearly three decades, voiced the most opposition to the new alignment, because it eliminates what has been an important goal for Virginia’s high school teams: advancing to region play.
“I’m not a ‘Give everyone a trophy’ kind of coach,” Crooks said. “‘Hoosiers’ is my favorite movie, with the small school going against the big teams. I’m not in to watering it down. I’m in to earning it when you get there.”