REALIGNED GWOC
American North: Greenville, Piqua, Sidney, Tippecanoe, Troy, Vandalia-Butler.
American South: Fairborn, Stebbions, Trotwood-Madison, West Carrollton, Xenia.
National East: Beavercreek, Centerville, Fairmont, Springfield, Wayne.
National West: Lebanon, Miamisburg, Northmont, Springboro.
Tippecanoe and Stebbins high schools jump from the Central Buckeye Conference to the realigned Greater Western Ohio Conference in all sports this fall. It’s a continuing expansion of the merger between the Western Ohio League and Greater Miami Valley Conference in the fall of 2001. The additions also bump one of the state’s largest conferences to a robust two leagues of four divisions, consisting of 20 teams.
Located north of Englewood and south of Troy off Interstate 75, Tipp is a growing community that has had long-term success in most sports as a CBC member. Extending that athletic prowess will be an immediate challenge.
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“The GWOC is definitely going to be a huge challenge for us,” Tipp head football coach Joel Derge said during a break in Friday’s 7-on-7 football scrimmage at the Red Devils’ campus. “Our kids are prepared for the challenge and ready to face some of that adversity that they’ll see in the GWOC. There’s certainly a lot more talent and good players.”
Tipp is lumped with Greenville, Piqua, Sidney, Troy and Vandalia-Butler in the six-team GWOC American North Division. There is long-ago history between most of those schools.
Stebbins has bounced around several conferences since being a charter member of the WOL. The Indians, located in Riverside, are paired with Fairborn, Trotwood-Madison, West Carrollton and Xenia in the five-team GWOC American South Division.
The GWOC National East Division is the least revised, featuring Beavercreek, Centerville, Fairmont, Springfield and Wayne. Those five teams previously were in the GWOC Central, which also included Northmont.
The remaining four members — Lebanon, Miamisburg, Northmont and Springboro — make up the GWOC National West Division.
“Basically, it was a size and geography setup,” explained veteran GWOC Commissioner Eric Spahr. “We’ve got nine larger schools and 11 schools that are a little bit smaller. It’s not a conventional setup in terms of numbers but it was what worked for our membership. We wanted all our schools an opportunity to compete for divisional championships. With the concept that we have, it will do that.”
Crossover games among teams in the same league — National or American — count in divisional standings in all sports except football.
Tipp and Stebbins frequented GWOC schedules as non-conference opponents. Trotwood has knocked Tipp out of the Division III football playoffs two of the last three seasons.
“Those two schools solidified our conference even more than it was before,” said Spahr, an instructor in the career tech program at Stebbins. “It allows us to do some things from a schedule prospective. It just worked out really well.
“It’s a long process bringing them into the fold. We’ve gone through a lot of changes over the last year-and-a-half. To finally get to that point where we see it implemented and played out, we’re obviously real excited.”
That maneuvering also prompted changes within the CBC and Ohio Heritage Conference.
The CBC also will lose Greenon, which will leave for the OHC in the fall of 2017. Jonathan Alder, located between Springfield and Columbus, also will join the CBC in 2017. Urbana will switch to the CBC Kenton Trail Division for 2016-17, then return to the CBC Mad River Division.
The OHC will expand to 12 teams and two divisions in 2017 with the additions of Madison Plains, Fairbanks, West Jefferson and Greenon.
Also facing a change are Clinton-Massie, East Clinton and Wilmington. Those Clinton County schools are the only remaining members of the South Central Ohio League. Its other five members – Washington Court House, Greenfield McClain, Hillsboro, Miami Trace and Chillicothe – started a new league with Jackson of the Southeast District.
Massie, East Clinton and Wilmington will join the 12-team Southern Buckeye Athletic & Academic Conference in 2017.
Spahr said GWOC administrators weren’t actively seeking to expand. He also wouldn’t rule out further additions.
“Given that I’ve done this for so many years, you never say never, obviously, but certainly we’re very pleased where we’re at as a conference,” he said. “We’ve never been afraid to make changes to make it better for our member schools.
“I get contacted quite a bit by other conferences around the state about how we do things and what our processes are. There’s a lot of respect for our conference in this state. We do things right. We have great people and great administrators in the conference. That’s what I love about it.”
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