Reclassification time has schools, leagues on edge once again

For a change when the every two year process of reclassification of the state’s high schools circles back into view, Medical Lake athletics director Chris Spring is breathing pretty easy.

The same might not be said for the Northeast A League where the Cardinals now play and have done so since 2012.

For the next month both Spring and NEA secretary Art Bickler will be monitoring things over at the Washington Interscholastic Athletic Association until Jan. 13, 2016 the last day for movement of schools before classifications for the next four years are announced the following day.

“It’s kind of an interesting process because as leagues and athletic directors we can sit here and we can speculate all we want,” Spring said with a laugh.

But until the opt-ups are real and the counts are determined it’s really irrelevant conversation other than seeing where the lines are going to fall.

“Really what it is, more than anything for us, is looking at the numbers the best we can and say, ‘Are we safe? Are we in jeopardy of going up?’” Spring said. “Every year I just hold my breath.”

It’s not an issue that at this point or in the foreseeable future. Medical Lake, with present enrollment in the low 400s is safe in its place for another cycle, now expanded to four years, but with the ability to appeal every two. Cheney is also staying put in 2A, Bickler said.

Deer Park and Colville, both onetime 2A schools who dropped down in the last cycle in 2014, remain some of the biggest schools in both the classification and the NEA.

“We’re pretty set in, not counting the opt-ups, at 441 (enrollment), Deer Park is the top of the As,” Bickler, a retired athletic director from Freeman, said. The As currently bottom out at 192, but the number is subject to change in the final tally.

Something that could change, however, is the complexion of the NEA. It could become a nine-team league.

“If we don’t have any opt-ups from the Bs to the 1As, it’s possible we could pick up a ninth school with Northwest Christian,” Bickler said.

Currently hovering within the A classification with enrollment of 206, it would take four schools to opt up into the A classification to push NWC back down.

Chewelah, rumored to be dropping down to 2B, will likely stay in the As with an enrollment of 214. Eight or nine schools would have to opt up to facilitate the Chewelah move down, Bickler said.

Nine teams present some challenges, specifically with scheduling. But the NEA at least has a contingency in place.

“We were thinking Chewelah was going to go down so obviously we scheduled football games with them,” Bickler said. They were slotted in with a bye. “If they stay they’d take the place of the bye.”

Spring was surprised with the news that Chewelah might remain an A school because the Cougars have been experiencing many of the same pains Spring’s Cardinals did when their enrollment left them at the bottom, and on the bubble in the 2A Great Northern League.

“We were exactly like Chewelah,” Spring said.

When Medical Lake was a 2A school, they struggled in sports like football where the GNL had schools ranging in enrollment from 500 to 1,000.

“You have kids in your high school who all of a sudden aren’t all that interested going out and taking a lickin’ on Friday night football and those types of things,” Spring said. It now turns into a mission to save programs.

The WIAA breaks its classes into groups of 65, or as close to that as possible. The process comes under criticism every cycle.

But neighboring states like Oregon, with nearly 300 schools as of 2013, feature varying numbers per classification. Idaho, with 157 schools has five of its six classifications in the 20s. None of the scenarios are idyllic, however.

“No matter what you do there’s no magic in it,” Spring said. “This thing has gone round and round, there’s been every set of eyes and mind in the state giving input.”

Spring wondered, “You almost wish if things didn’t work out (you might) have another plan to add a classification at the top.”

“It’s always going to be four or five schools being extremely unhappy at the bubble of each classification,” Spring concluded.

The present system is good for some schools, it’s not good for others, Spring said. “That’s never going to change and there’s no perfect system.”

Paul Delaney can be reached at [email protected].