Published: Dec. 7, 2013
By NICHOLAS DETTMANN
Daily News Sports Editor
Come the fall of 2015, Kettle Moraine Lutheran and Kewaskum
high schools will be conference rivals.
The WIAA’s Board of Control voted 6-2 in favor of the Green
Bay Realignment plan during Friday’s meeting in Stevens Point.
Kewaskum Athletic Director Jason Piittmann is in favor of
the proposal, while KML Athletic Director Len Collyard isn’t, citing extended
travel for conference games as a primary reason. “I know it’s difficult to get
to this stage after how long the process has been going on and when it comes
out that this is going to be the plan, how do we make changes?” Collyard said.
“We gave it our best shot and it didn’t come out our way.
“We have to move forward and make this work out.”
The new conference, which doesn’t have a name will be
Berlin, Campbellsport, KML, Kewaskum, Plymouth, Ripon, Waupun and Winneconne.
Schools affected by the plan, more than 100, have 40 days to
file an appeal. The plan is scheduled to go into effect for the 2015-16 school
year.
Collyard said he will file an appeal, but doesn’t believe it
has much chance of being considered.
At this point, the only action the board can do is to either
accept the plan as is or reject it. No modifications can be made.
“I may go through the motions of sending an appeal so that
it registers that we weren’t in favor of it,” Collyard said. “But in reality, I
don’t think there’s any point in making a real serious attempt to appeal. It
doesn’t appear that we have the option to suggest a modification.
“Our appeal would have to be strong enough or there would
have to be a lot of appeals. I’m not convinced an appeal will do any good.”
When asked if he and KML’s administration might consider
legal action, Collyard said it’d “be foolish.”
In the end, Collyard believes the reason why the proposal
went through was because it’s been a project two years in the making and with
it involving so many schools, it’s almost impossible to please everyone.
“We have to find some way to make this a positive thing for
us,” Collyard said.
“It’s not the perfect fit, but that’s because there ought to
be something better, but I can’t find something better,” he added.
The competition factor was not an issue for KML.
“We’re in a tough spot with our size,” Collyard said.
While KML will do its best to make the change work, Collyard
said if an opportunity comes up to change to a conference with a better fit, he
will consider it.
It is the second time in 10 years KML will have to change
conferences. The Chargers joined the Wisconsin Flyway Conference in 2006 after
the Parkland Conference was discontinued.
As for Kewaskum, it will end a 30-year partnership with the
Eastern Wisconsin Conference.
“We’ve got great friendships with a lot of the schools,”
Piittmann said.
The new conference will combine teams from the Flyway, the
EWC and the Eastern Valley.
“It’s going to be an interesting challenge,” Piittmann said.
“We’ve got a lot of work ahead of us. I think it’ll be a good thing.”
With the creation of a conference, there are a lot of steps
that need to be taken for the next two years in preparation for the change.
The first order of business will be, what to name the
conference?
Among the other issues that will need to be addressed is
developing a conference constitution and bylaws.
“Change is always challenging,” Piittmann said. “We’ll have
to get used to all these differences.”
What should make the development of the conference’s rules
interesting, Piittmann added, is eight schools from three conferences will
blend with a previous set of ideas.
“We’ve got to start from scratch,” Piittmann said.
“I’m confident things will work out and we’ll find a way to
make this successful,” Collyard said.
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