Starting next year the athletic teams of MHS will not be traveling to Canby and instead they will compete with three Hillsboro teams for the Pacific Conference. Glencoe, Century and Hillsboro being added and Canby being moved to the Three Rivers conference are some of many changes taking place around the state.
The new changes have come about mostly because of the six classifications of schools and the loss or gain in enrollment. Every four years the leagues will be up for change again. Enrollment will be examined, and teams will be placed where they fit best.
There will be hybrid teams in order to make traveling more cost effective. For example, Roseburg which often competed with the Salem teams will be the only 6A team in a hybrid league next year.
Athletic director Sean Burke is worried that the increase in the amount of teams in the conference could affect how many non conference games are played, especially in soccer. The way the schedule works out soccer could end up having no pre-season and jump right into conference play.
"Overall it could be tougher because you have more conference games," said Burke.
"It takes away some of your flexibility," said volleyball head coach Ben Patterson.
Another thing that the state is thinking of changing is the criterion by which teams have to uphold in order to get into playoffs. Power rankings are one of the topics up for debate, which would be based primarily on non-conference play. This option would put the new Pacific Conference at a disadvantage because the other four leagues only have six schools and would therefore have a better chance to play non-conference opponents.
"Losing Canby kind of takes away some of the challenge of league play," said Patterson. "They were kind of the perennial powerhouse that we measured ourselves against."
This year the Grizzlies traveled to Glencoe's volleyball tournament and won the whole thing. This brings some concern as to how strong the league will be in the volleyball end.
"I'd prefer the league to stay the way that it was," said Patterson.
On the girls basketball side of things the league should be just as tough.
"Canby's been really strong the last few years, so we're losing a good team there," said Coste. "Glencoe, however, has made it to the playoffs a number of times and Hillsboro has gotten tougher." Coste said that when he coached at Beaverton, Glencoe made the playoffs just about every year.
Overall, the basketball teams prefer the change because next year the home court advantage will be even. This year some of the teams the Grizzlies had to play, they played away twice.
"The biggest advantage I see is that now we'll play everybody at two rounds instead of three," said head coach of boys' basketball, Willie Graham.
"Regardless, I don't think anybody likes playing each other three times," said girls' basketball head coach Sean Coste.
The plaques set up in the red gym, one for each team in our league, will be taken down for next year. The plaques were made before Burke was the athletic director and he isn't sure who originally made them.
"I don't like the massive changes we're going through," said Burke. In years past it has been easier for MHS to adjust, Burke said, because there used to only be four classifications instead of the six that exist now.
Hillsboro high is a 5A school this year, and next year will be moving up to the 6A level. In just about every sport, adding the three Hillsboro teams will make the conference more difficult.
"Now every game is a battle," said Burke.
Adding the new teams will also bring a new atmosphere to games, and new traditions will be built.
"I look forward to the diversity, I think it's going to be fun playing different teams," said Coste.