One local high school is planning to get a head start on the new eight-player football division the Michigan High School Athletic Association will unveil in 2010.

Eastern Washtenaw Multicultural Academy, a charter public school academy located at 5550 Platt Road in Ann Arbor, has scheduled one eight-player game this season and hopes to add a few more contests as it prepares to fully launch the sport next fall.

“We’re trying to finalize things, but eight-man football is really new to everybody,” said KC Furrha, a coordinator for the 5-year-old school open to pre-K through 12th-grade students. This upcoming school year will be its second with high school-age students.

“We’re trying to see how we can make this work out for the school and for the kids,” he said.

The MHSAA announced in May that Class D schools with a maximum enrollment of 223 for the 2009-2010 academic year will be eligible to field eight-player teams. Approximately 80 of EWMA’s anticipated enrollment of 250 will be in grades 9-12.

In eight-man football, there are two less linemen and one less back than in traditional 11-man football. Instead of seven players on the line of scrimmage, only five are on the line when the ball is snapped.

The field is 100 yards long from goal line to goal line, but the width of the field is 40 yards -- about 40 feet narrower than regulation high school fields.

The MHSAA said it will sponsor a 16-team, four-week playoff in 2010 if at least 20 schools commit to the sport. A 32-team, five-week playoff will take place if more than 40 schools commit.

“The option of an eight-player division will benefit our smaller schools which have struggled to maintain sufficient numbers to sponsor football programs, and at the same time create an opportunity for other members of similar size to offer the football experience,” MHSAA executive director John Roberts said in a release.

Shortly after the MHSAA announced the new division, The Saginaw News reported three small Thumb-area schools that currently participate in 11-player football - Owendale-Gagetown, Akron-Fairgrove and Carsonville-Port Sanillac - agreed to play each other in home-and-home series using the eight-player format this fall.

EWMA is scheduled to play Owendale-Gagetown on Friday, Oct. 16.

Right now, that’s about the extent of the finalized football experience for Furrha and the students at EWMA.

“We haven’t started anything. We just told the kids we’d have eight-man football in the fall and asked them to go and do a little conditioning themselves,” Furrha said. “We’re trying to schedule some more games and finalizing everything here. Hopefully in the next week or two, things will be more clear.”

While there’s been no formal football activities, Furrha said he knows students are excited about the prospect of suiting up.

“Any time you offer sports, their eyes just light up,” he said.

While those three Thumb schools have previously-established football programs, Furrha said the rest of the schools he’s been in contact with about eight-player football are in the same start-up mode EWMA finds itself.

“It’s been tough,” he said. “The biggest challenge to the first year is that it’s the first year. That in itself is a big challenge. Hopefully things will work out for the kids.”

Being able to schedule games in or near Washtenaw County would help EWMA with travel expenses, but it’s unlikely it will find any local competition this year.

Jeffrey Donat, the booster club president for Saline-based Washtenaw Christian Academy, said the school had initial conversations about eight-player football when the MHSAA made its announcement. He deferred further comment to new athletic director John Aunins, who did not return phone calls.

Plans are also unknown for Ann Arbor Central Academy, which gave 11-man football a test run in 2004, but dropped the sport after losing eight games by a combined score of 412-14.

Ann Arbor Rudolf Steiner High School looked at eight-player football as an option, but decided not to pursue it. Athletic director Becky Chapin said the school felt it would take away from its fledgling boys soccer program and that the initial cost for football equipment was prohibitive.

EWMA principal Rhonda Furrha said her school - which also hopes to add basketball this winter - is interested in offering team sports as a way to “teach students self-discipline, keep them on track with grades and teach them teamwork."

She also agreed that offering certain extracurricular activities could help draw more students to the relatively new school.

“It could draw students, but that’s not our main concern,” she said. “Our main concern is providing activities for the students that we do have.”

ONLINE EXTRAS Eight-player football has been sanctioned in Missouri since 1988, but The Kansas City Star recently reported that after 20 years, the sport has been slow to catch on in the state.

Wondering what eight-player football looks like? Check out these video highlights from the 2008 Kansas State High School Activities Association 8-Man Division 1 football championship game.