GP, Snohomish, Terrace among schools affected by WIAA reclassification

Glacier Peak is moving up, while its crosstown rival is moving down.

Glacier Peak was the final high school to make the cut for 4A according to enrollment figures for the 2016-20 classification cycle released Thursday by the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association.

The classifications are used to determine which district, regional and state tournaments a school is eligible for.

A school’s classification is based on enrollment numbers in grades 9-11 as reported to the Office of Public Instruction (OSPI) for the months of January, February, March, April, May, October and November. The figures were released to WIAA members in November, and each of the 384 schools was given a month to review them and decide if it wanted to opt up by the Jan. 13 deadline.

“We said we were going to stay where we fell, and (4A is) where we fell,” Glacier Peak athletic director Mark Albertine said. “In the end, we fell where I thought we were going to fall.”

Glacier Peak, which averaged 1,343.29 students over the seven-month period, narrowly edged out Redmond (1,343.16) as the final 4A school. Other than the 22 schools that chose to opt up, Glacier Peak will be the smallest 4A school in the state.

“The majority of coaches wanted to opt up and be 4A anyway,” Albertine said. “However, it wasn’t a super majority, which we all felt was necessary for us to agree to our decision. So we decided that we’d play were we fell.”

Glacier Peak didn’t know where that would be until the deadline at 4 p.m. Wednesday. In fact, GP was a 3A school at one point Wednesday, before Spanaway Lake and Bethel rescinded their opt-up requests, pushing the Grizzlies and Olympia back to 4A. “It was an interesting ride,” Albertine said.

While Glacier Peak is moving up, its crosstown rival, Snohomish, is moving down. With an enrollment of 1,283.09, the Panthers drop from 4A to 3A.

Cascade was one of the 22 schools that opted up to 4A, part of one of the largest group of schools to opt up in the WIAA’s history. Thirteen schools opted up to 3A, one to 2A (Archbishop Murphy), eight to 1A and four to 2B.

Of the 384 total member schools, there will be 65 schools in the 4A, 3A, 2A and 1A classifications and 62 in the 2B and 1B classifications for the 2016-20 classification cycle.

The numbers remain unofficial until the WIAA’s Executive Board meets Jan. 24-25. Schools have until Jan. 19 to file a classification appeal petition.

Albertine said there are several reasons a school might opt up, particularly this time around, as the WIAA switches from a two- to a four-year classification cycle.

“Transportation and travel was mentioned by some other schools,” Albertine said. “They (also) were worried about what league they were going to be in.”

Snohomish was on the cusp of being a 4A team, but the large number of opt-ups bumped the Panthers to 3A, where they elected to stay.

“When the numbers came out at first before all the opt-ups, we knew that we were going to end up on the bubble or close,” Snohomish athletic director Mark Perry said. “Then the opt-ups started hitting and officially last week we were called by the WIAA office and told we were now below the line and did we want to opt up or not? As a coaching staff, the coaches voted to go where the numbers put us.”

It’s still to be determined how the reclassifications will shape the three Wesco leagues. It’s possible that Snohomish and Glacier Peak could switch places, with Glacier Peak going to the Wesco 4A and Snohomish to the Wesco 3A South. However, Perry and the Panthers would prefer to be in the Wesco 3A North because of historic rivalries with teams such as Marysville Pilchuck and Everett.

“There will be a meeting with the athletic directors to start to make some of those decisions on which schools will go north and which schools will go south,” Perry said.

Everett and Snohomish are the two border schools, Perry said, and it’s possible both could be in the Wesco 3A North. Either way, Snohomish’s non-league rivalry games with Glacier Peak will continue.

There also will be changes in the Wesco 3A/2A South. The league will still have one 2A member, but that school has changed. Shorecrest, which has been a 2A team competing in a 3A league, will move up to 3A next season and Mountlake Terrace, a bubble 3A team the past couple cycles, will drop to 2A.

As a result, the Hawks plan to join a new 12-team, football-only 2A league that will include two divisions, Terrace athletic director Kim Stewart said. Other schools in the proposed league include Cascade Conference members Archbishop Murphy, Cedarcrest, Granite Falls and Lakewood, as well as Northwest Conference members Lynden, Sehome, Sedro-Woolley, Burlington-Edison, Blaine, Anacortes and Bellingham.

The proposed league will be discussed at an athletic directors meeting on Friday.

“One of the things I think that’s cool about this football league is they’re going to take the four football teams that are usually pretty strong and split them up two each in each division,” Stewart said. “The rest of us will be drawn randomly. There won’t be a north-south type of thing.”

Stewart said that contrary to what many people think, Mountlake Terrace did not opt up to 3A for the current cycle. The Hawks were near the bottom of the 3A enrollment list.

“(After the last enrollment numbers were out) we got a call from the WIAA asking us if we wanted to opt down and the principal and I said we were going to follow the WIAA guidelines and we’ll land where we land,” Stewart said. “This year where we landed was in 2A and so that’s where we’ll go. We’ve been one of the smallest 3A schools for years. Instead of being the bottom of the heap as far as enrollment figures we’ll be one of the biggest (2A schools).”

The 2A and 1A teams in the Cascade Conference remain unchanged, with Archbishop Murphy opting up to 2A. Granite Falls, with an enrollment of 461.25 students, was the cutoff for 2A schools. Connell (461.13) was the start of the 1A schools, which include King’s, Cedar Park Christian-Bothell, South Whidbey and Sultan.

The list of full enrollment figures can be found here.