We’ve finished the next-to-last week of the Alabama High School Athletic Association football regular season, and it’s usually the last week for action within each region — which means that playoff positions are normally locked up by now.

But that’s not so for some local teams.

Locust Fork is involved in three-way ties in their regions, as is Gardendale and Pinson Valley. The difference is that the Hornets have yet to settle their tiebreakers, while the Rockets and Indians know their placement now.

Key to both of these situations is the AHSAA tiebreaker rule that is in play. It states that when three teams are involved and each has an identical record against the other two, that the order is determined by the number of wins by each of the non-region opponents that were defeated by the tied teams.

In Class 6A Region 6, the Indians got into their tie with their upset win over Shades Valley. That created a three-way tie for second through fourth places in the standings that also involves Gardendale.

However, Shades Valley has wins over three other teams, while Pinson Valley has just two. The problem was that one of the Cougars’ opponents was a Louisiana team (played on ESPN), and there was some debate as to whether the AHSAA would count that game in their standings and their tiebreaker.

That was settled Tuesday, as the AHSAA ruled in favor of Shades Valley. They will be seeded second, Gardendale third and Pinson Valley fourth.

That means Arab will play at Clay, the Rockets will go to Fort Payne (whom they beat in Week 9) and the Tribe goes to Southside-Gadsden.

In Class 4A Region 7, three teams — Locust Fork, Oneonta and North Jackson — are tied for first place. Basically, the Hornets would have to beat Hokes Bluff on Thursday, while the Redskins would have to lose to Piedmont and the Chiefs fall to East Limestone. There are other possibilities involved as well, with permutations that would take hours to sort through.

Elsewhere, Mortimer Jordan has a two seed in Class 5A and will host Etowah on Nov. 7, while Fultondale awaits the settlement of a three-way tie to see if they travel to Pike County, Slocomb or Daleville.