MONROE — The WIAA Board of Control passed the state-wide football conference realignment at a meeting April 16 in Stevens Point.

The proposal, first brought to the WIAA by the Wisconsin Football Coaches Association, rearranges many conferences throughout the state to balance schools and the conferences they play in based on enrollment, a change known as “competitive equity.” The proposal also took into account travel logistics and rivalries and will be implemented for the 2020 fall season. It passed by unanimous vote.

What emerged was full-scale revamp from across the state — and one that effects all seven local teams. 

In the new makeup, no conference will have more than eight teams, or fewer than seven — allowing for two nonconference games to be scheduled per school for weeks one and two. For conferences with seven teams, a sister conference will have each team play a crossover game to count in the conference standings. With the WIAA playoffs based primarily on conference record (with overall record as tiebreaker), many schools struggled to stay competitive with others in their league when playing one and sometimes two divisions below others.

Monroe went 2-7 in 2018, with a 2-5 mark in the Badger South. All five conference losses were against Division 2 opponents, and the two wins against Division 3 schools. In the new conference alignment, seven of the eight Rock Valley schools Monroe would play against will be Division 3, with Edgerton in Division 4, just six students shy of being D3.

The Cheesemakers (enrollment 690) and Madison Edgewood (486) will move from the Badger South to the Rock Valley. The Badger South and North will then be split into the Badger Large and Small conferences, with Janesville Craig (1865) and Janesville Parker (1517) moving in from the Big Eight, an all-Division 1 conference.

“I would have preferred that the Badger Conference go Big/Small for football rather than being split up,” Monroe athletic director Jeff Newcomer said. “The disparity in enrollment between the teams with the original schools is less than it will be now with the Janesville school joining the Badger Big.”

The new football-only Rock Valley will also include McFarland (707), Jefferson (663), East Troy (604), Whitewater (578), Evansville (555) and Edgerton (539).

“All in all, Monroe will be just fine in the Rock Valley. We will be the second biggest, behind McFarland. The Rock Valley has a lot of great football programs and we are excited to see where we fit in,” Newcomer said.

Brodhead-Juda (413) will move out of the Rock Valley and into the Southwest Conference, joining River Valley (430), Platteville (430), Dodgeville (421), Richland Center (386), Prairie du Chien (365) and New Glarus-Monticello (360), which moves in from the Capitol South.

The SWAL will also be revamped, with Parkview-Albany (332), a new co-op that begins in 2019, and Belleville (283) joining the likes of Lancaster (270), Fennimore (238), Cuba City (238), Darlington (207) and Mineral Point (199).

Pecatonica-Argyle (216) and Black Hawk-Warren (160) will remain in the Six Rivers, which will add Southwestern (167) and Iowa-Grant (172) from the SWAL. Potosi-Cassville (192), River Ridge (171) and Benton-Shullsburg-Scales Mound (266) will make up the rest of the league.

Qualifying for the postseason will remain the same — a 4-3 record in conference is an automatic bid. The Six Rivers and SWAL are sister conferences, which could pit Darlington against Black Hawk or Pecatonica once every seven years.

Schools will have a two-year window to request movement out of a conference based on a move to 8-man football or other unforeseen issues. The WIAA will also reassess enrollments every two years and make any adjustments necessary to keep the competitive equity.