Committee approves high school realignment

Rock Hill, Northwestern back in same region; 4 locals to drop to AAA

By Barry Byers - bbbyers@heraldonline.com

COLUMBIA -- The South Carolina High School League's new realignment proposal was approved unanimously by its Executive Committee on Thursday.

Nine appeals were pending from the original plan, which was released in August. The realignment is for all the state's schools and begins with the 2010-2011 school year. It will be in effect for two years, 2010-2012 for sports competition purposes.

The new proposal had no bearing on local teams. Lancaster appealed the first realignment, hoping to stay in Region 4-AAAA.

“We're right here at I-77, and it's no problem for us to play the teams we already play,'' said Bennie McMurray, Lancaster's football coach. “The trips are not long, and we get home at a decent time. But this isn't a football issue. We play once a week. It's an issue for our other sports.''

He used basketball as an example, pointing out that boys games start at 8 or 8:30 p.m., and trips on Tuesday would have the players getting home late on a school night.

The new proposal left Clover, Gaffney, Lancaster, Northwestern, Rock Hill and Spartanburg as they were with the first one.

Region 4-AAA also stayed intact, with Fort Mill, Nation Ford, South Pointe and York moving down a classification and joining Chester and Fairfield Central.

McMurray said he's been in meetings with Lancaster's principal, Joe Keenan, and athletics director Mark Strickland. They were in agreement that an appeal needed to be made after the first realignment because of the long trips.

“It's not just for us,'' McMurray said. “It's the same for Spartanburg and Gaffney. The way it is just doesn't take the kids into consideration.''

Any appeal must be made in writing to the League office by Nov. 17. Appeals will be heard Nov. 24.

The appeals process comes with a set of rules:

All appeals must include alternative realignment proposal.Any alternate proposal must include all classifications affected by the proposed change(s).

If proposal affects regions or classifications, the appealing school must contact those schools affected by the proposal and make them aware of the pending appeal.

Example: If a school(s) leaves or moves into a classification or region, those classifications or regions are affected.

Jerome Singleton, the League's Executive Director, told The (Columbia) State newspaper that he made changes to the original proposal, “keeping in mind some of the appeals that we had” for that initial plan.

The Chapin situation

Chapin had notified the SCHSL that it was considering a lawsuit after the original proposal was released. It had the Eagles in a Greenville region, with road games being 50 miles or more one-way.

Lawyers representing Chapin considered the suit based on two issues: Travel and giving the Executive Committee, which had to approve or disapprove the proposal, the authority to modify the realignment.

The new proposal left Chapin's football team in the Greenville area's Region 3-AAA, but moved the other sports into Columbia-based Region 5-AAA. Chapin AD and football coach Scott Earley told The State that the compromise addressed his school's concerns.

The most sweeping changes came in Class A, among them moving the Governor's School for Science and Math from Region 3-A to 7-A. Lewisville and Great Falls remained in 3-A.

But the changes were dramatic. The original proposal had nine regions. The Lower State was completely overhauled, and when it was done, there were only eight regions.

New realignments proposal

Class AAAA

Region 1: Easley, Greenwood, Laurens, T.L. Hanna, Westside, Woodmont, Wren

Region 2: Boiling Springs, Byrnes, Dorman, Hillcrest, J.L. Mann, Mauldin, Riverside

Region 3: Clover, Gaffney, Lancaster, Northwestern Rock Hill, Spartanburg

Region 4: Blythewood, Dutch Fork, Irmo, Lugoff-Elgin (all sports except football), Richland Northeast, Ridge View, Spring Valley

Region 5: Aiken, Lexington, North Augusta, Orangeburg-Wilkinson, South Aiken, White Knoll

Region 6: Carolina Forest, Conway, Lugoff-Elgin (football only), South Florence, Sumter, West Florence