East Greene Joins Rolling Hills Conference

WILL COMPETE AGAIN WITH PC, GR

East Greene will become a member of the Rolling Hills Activities Conference effective with the 2010-2011 school year. East Greene is currently a member of the West Central Conference.

Members of the Rolling Hills are 1A schools while the enrollments of the current West Central members are divided between 1A and 2A schools, depending upon the sport. In track, all but two of the West Central schools are 1A but in basketball this past season there were just 4 in 1A with the remaining 6 in 2A. In girls basketball and volleyball this year only EG, Madrid, Coon-Rapids-Bayard and Des Moines Christian were in 1A while Panorama, Guthrie Center, Earlham, Van Meter, West Central Valley and Woodward-Granger were in 2A. The ratio was the same in boys basketball, but Des Moines Christian, the only private school in the league, opted to play up a class as its Basic Enrollment Data Survey (BEDS) enrollment of 159 was just under the 2A cutoff, which would have made it the largest 1A school in the state. As DMC moved up, that meant a 2A school had to move down to keep the numbers even, and that school was another West Central member, Woodward-Granger. So in boys basketball, EG, Madrid, WG and CRB were the 1A schools and the other 6 were in 2A.

Two current members of the Rolling Hills are Paton-Churdan and Glidden-Ralston, longtime rivals of East Greene. Other members of the 10-team league are Adair-Casey, Ankeny Christian Academy, CAM (Anita), Elk Horn-Kimballton, Exira, Iowa Christian Academy (West Des Moines), Orient-Macksburg and Walnut.

Each of the current league members participates in volleyball and girls and boys basketball, but some have sharing arrangements in the other official league sports of boys and girls track, boys and girls golf, baseball and softball. Elk Horn-Kimballton and Exira will share all sports next year, which dropped the league to nine members, creating a spot for East Greene.

East Greene had responded to an invitation sent out by the Rolling Hills last year, but no action was taken by the league, but the move was made in advance of proposed changes expected the following year due to declining enrollments in districts covered by the Rolling Hills area—central, west central, western and southwestern Iowa.

SHIFTING ALIANCES: East Greene has been a member of the current West Central Conference since the 1996-1997 school year, when it joined the league along with Paton-Churdan and Glidden-Ralston. All three had been members of the Coon River Valley Conference along with Southeast Webster, another longtime EG rival, and four schools categorized more as northwest Iowa schools—Schaller-Crestland, Pomeroy-Palmer, Newell-Fonda and St. Mary’s (Storm Lake). EG and GR formed the southern edge of the conference.

The West Central in 1995-96 was comprised of Guthrie Center, Panorama, Coon Rapids-Bayard, Van Meter, Martensdale-St. Mary’s, Earlham, Adair-Casey and Nodaway Valley (Greenfield). That year—1996—proved to be rather pivotal as each of these leagues—Coon River Valley, West Central and Rolling Hills—saw some major shifting, along with the Pride of Iowa Conference, which like the West Central, had more of a southern Iowa flavor or “below Interstate 80.”

Martensdale and St. Mary’s are in Warren County, Earlham is in Madison County, and the communities that formed Nodaway Valley—Greenfield, Bridgewater and Fontanelle—are in southern Adair County. Nodaway Valley was formed by merger of Greenfield with its smaller school neighbor to the south and west, Bridgewater-Fontanelle.

That year saw Martensdale-St. Mary’s and Nodaway Valley leave the West Central to join the Pride of Iowa which had been a six-team league—Mount Ayr, I-35 (Truro), Southeast Warren, Wayne (Corydon), Central Decatur (Leon), and East Union (Afton). Geographically, the Pride of Iowa was much more southern Iowa-oriented as where Warren and Adair counties are in the third row up from the Missouri border, Decatur and Wayne counties are in first tier or actual border counties, and Mount Ayr is the county seat of Ringgold, another border county, and Union is the county just to the north of Ringgold.

While the shift of Martensdale and Nodaway made the Pride of Iowa an 8-team league, the West Central was left with just four teams as Earlham and Adair-Casey had defected to the Rolling Hills which was a league of 7 teams in southwest Iowa—Lenox, Corning, Orient-Macksburg, Walnut, Exira, Elk Horn-Kimballton and CAM, which was and continues to be a whole-grade and activities sharing arrangement between the Anita and Cumberland & Massena school districts. Among those seven school locations, only Exira and Elk Horn were north of Interstate 80, and each by fewer than 10 miles.

Several years later, Corning and Lenox left for the Pride of Iowa and Earlham joined the West Central in 2006, leaving the Rolling Hills with just 6 members. But during that period, Iowa Christian Academy had added varsity level sports as had the new Ankeny Christian Academy in Ankeny. Those two became Rolling Hills members in the mid-00s, while Paton-Churdan left the West Central after the 2006-2007 season and Glidden-Ralston did the same after 2008-2009.

PC, GR and EG had initially joined the West Central the same year Des Moines Christian joined and those four schools along with Panorama, Guthrie Center, Van Meter and CRB were the nucleus of the league until West Central Valley (formerly the Stuart-Menlo and Dexfield of Redfield districts) joined in 2001.

DMC had been a K-8 school in the Beaverdale area of Des Moines but added high school program in the 1990s and was already planning to build a new high school campus in the western suburbs of Des Moines. That new campus has since opened in the Timberline area in Urbandale (west of I-35/80). After DMC came onto the scene, a second private Christian high school opened, Grandview Park Baptist, in northeast Des Moines. Iowa Christian and Ankeny Christian followed, giving the Des Moines are four small, independent schools. East Greene has competed with all of them since their founding, so a relationship with the ICA and ACA has already existed.

After West Central Valley joined the West Central, the league became nine members. A few years later, Earlham left the Pride of Iowa and joined the West Central, making it an even-numbered 10-team league. Despite the defections of PC and GR the league stayed at 10 members, as it added Madrid two years ago to replace PC and last year Woodward-Granger joined as a replacement to GR.

Both Madrid and WG had been members of the Heart of Iowa, which divides itself up in Large and Small divisions. Both were in the Small division. As declining enrollments have been affecting a wide swath of schools, each time a team leaves the Heart of Iowa (comprised of mostly 2A but some 3A and 1A schools) another school from a larger league shifts down because they have found it hard to compete among the larger 3A schools. Jefferson-Scranton is a case in point. JS joined the HOI (Large) two years ago to replace Madrid, and this year Nevada became a member to take the spot vacated by Woodward-Granger. Each had been a member of the all-3A Raccoon River Conference. And Boone, which was either a small 4A or a big 3A, depending upon whichever IHSAA or IGHSAU enrollment classifications were in play for a particular sport, moved from the Little Hawkeye (big 3A schools like Norwalk, Pella and formerly Waukee, now a 4A) to the Raccoon River, replacing Nevada.

EYE ON GJ SAYS: This move to the Rolling Hills seems to be a mixed bag for the East Greene Community School District. At first glance, it would seem to be a “no brainer” as it levels the playing field for the athletes competing for East Greene. No longer would a school with a BEDS enrollment of 81 (dropping to a projected 74 in three years) like EG have to go head-to-head in individual (golf, track) and team sports against schools with more than double the BEDS enrollment, such as West Central Valley and Panorama.

Yet on the other hand, the students and fans actually know pretty much where the towns that make up West Central Valley and Panorama are located, albeit they enroll more students. Stuart, Menlo, Redfield and Dexter of the WCV district are down by the Interstate (80), while Panora and Lake Panorama and the former YJB towns that make up the district (Bagley, Yale, Jamaica) are just over the Greene County line south into Guthrie County. Earlham, Van Meter, Madrid, Woodward—-all small towns in the “near Des Moines” realm not at all unlike Grand Junction, Rippey and Dana. And who in eastern Greene County is not familiar with Guthrie Center, Coon Rapids or Bayard?

But Walnut? Orient? Macksburg?? These are not words that roll easily off the lips of most Greene Countians. Walnut is in Pottawattamie County—as in Council Bluffs and the Missouri River—-which actually puts it closer to Omaha than to Guthrie Center, yet alone Grand Junction or Rippey. Orient-Macksburg is closer to Missouri than it is Churdan or Grand Junction. And Elk Horn and Exira are western Iowa towns, plain and simple. So we now seem to be stretching this “west central Iowa” and “rolling hills” concepts rather widely. If we stretch too far will they snap?

Think about it. When its 10 below degrees zero in Iowa in January how many fans are going to show up at the Rippey gym to see EG take on Orient-Macksburg, for gosh sakes? Or the “big” Walnut-EG game??

On the flip side, though, it will be good to re-engage year-round competition with Paton-Churdan and Glidden-Ralston, one a real-deal Greene County school and the other located just across our western county border. These are schools more in line with EG’s enrollment, as are Walnut and Orient-Macksburg, to be fair. And the proximity of Ankeny Christian (in Ankeny) and Iowa Christian Academy in West Des Moines will offset the long trips to Walnut, Orient and Elk Horn (or Exira depending how their sports sharing and whole grade sharing alignments shake out).