Schools brace for coming realignment

ASHEBORO — The NCHSAA is expected to have the first draft of the new eight-class realignment by the Christmas holiday break, but schools began projecting possible conferences after the official Average Daily Membership numbers were released last week.

Asheboro will be the lone Randolph County school in a 6-A league. Uwharrie Charter, Randleman and Southwestern Randolph will be in the 4-A classification. Eastern Randolph, Providence Grove, Trinity and Wheatmore will be 3-A schools. 

Most county officials are hoping the 3-A and 4-A teams will remain in one conference as the current realignment has seven Randolph County teams comprising the 1-A/2-A Piedmont Athletic Conference. If the teams stay together, it would be a 3-A/4-A league. Not much would need to change.

“We haven’t heard specifically what’s going to happen, but I would think it’s going to be similar to what we have now,” Randleman High School Athletic Director Jake Smith said. “It will just go from 1-A/2-A to 3-A/4-A. Just having those common opponents in your area cuts down on travel and you know you are going to have good gates for all athletics.”

UCA will make a jump to the 4-A classification and has a larger ADM number than every other school in the county except AHS (1,286 ADM). UCA’s ADM was 875 compared to RHS’ 868, SWR’s 800, Trinity’s 673, WHS’ 664, PG’s 587 and ER’s 585. PG and ER’s ADM numbers are the two lowest in the 3-A West Region.

“We feel like we’re staying in a pretty good regional place with natural rivalries,” UCA AD David Hayes said of a possible new conference featuring the same teams from the PAC. “This would be great based on who is around us. It’s a great conference across the board in most sports with good competition.”

Other local ADs from the PAC are hoping the conference can remain the same with as little change as possible.

“We haven’t heard anything, but we’ve talked about the possibility of being with the other county schools,” SWR AD Chris Chapman said. “Maybe adding another school or two. We’ve been working with them for a while and with most in the same school system (UCA is the only school that is not in the RCSS), we would have the same school calendar for Spring break. I know there will be some changes, but I don’t know ours is going to change very much.”

Like the rest of the county schools, Trinity and Wheatmore are waiting to see where they will be placed in the realignment.

“It’s tough, especially when you start talking about a new football contract, but we’re in the same boat as everyone else,”

Trinity AD Robert Mitchell said. “Nobody can get a head start until they hear.”

One prediction has all seven county teams in one conference along with North Moore, which is now a 3-A team. 

Wheatmore is hoping to get away from a league featuring all Randolph County teams.

“In a perfect world, we would be in with some of the Davidson County schools,” Wheatmore AD Andrew Davis said. “We just can’t compete with some of the schools now. Athletics is about making money or competing and to make money you have to compete. We were hoping to get away.”

Providence Grove AD Cody Moran said early on in the process, some schools were talking about a conference with Randolph and Davidson county schools. 

“We could have been pretty competitive in that,” Moran said. “It would have been nice to play some different teams. But here again, it’s high school sports and you’re going to play well-coached teams every week who have athletes on them. I feel like we’re going to be right around the same conference we are in now.”

Asheboro will be in a 6-A league and who will be with the Blue Comets is anyone’s guess at the moment. 

“Everything is under lock and key right now,” AHS AD Wes Berrier said. “People are predicting what is going to happen and we have done some of that on our end.”

If Asheboro remains in the West, other 6-A schools include Dudley, Ben L. Smith, Ragsdale, Western Guilford,  Eastern Guilford and Northern Guilford. Teams in the 6-A East include former conference members Burlington Williams, Southern Alamance and Union Pines. 

One prediction has Asheboro joining Lee County, Union Pines, Western Harnett, Southern Lee, Seaforth and Montgomery Central in a split 5-A/6-A league.  

The NCHSAA will release first drafts of the new leagues by mid-December and schools will then have approximately one month for discussion and appeals.

“You are always going to look at geography and how close schools are to one another,” said NCHSAA President and Randolph County Schools System Superintendent Dr. Stephen Gainey. “It’s going to be a long process. We’ll let the committee run with the process and make recommendations. No one is going to do something intentionally to hurt someone, but we know no plan is going to make everyone happy.

“I think the opportunity for there to be split conferences is there,” he added.  

“We will come up with a plan that works and I’m looking forward to seeing what unfolds over the next few months.”