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WV SSAC releases new high school classifications

Charleston Gazette-Mail file photo by Kenny Kemp Nitro players enter the field to take on St. Albans.
Charleston Gazette-Mail file photo by Kenny Kemp
Nitro players enter the field to take on St. Albans.

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — The West Virginia Secondary School Activities Commission released its new classification alignment Thursday, a move that will create a significantly altered landscape for high school sports into the next decade.

The SSAC, which traditionally has divided its member schools into three competitive classes, kept its three-class format for school years beginning in 2016-17 and ending in 2019-20. However, the governing body’s former method of dividing the classes between an even number of schools was eliminated in favor of trying to find a better competitive balance.

“There has been a lot of concern about the size of [Class] triple-A,” said Bernie Dolan, who is set to replace Gary Ray as the executive director of the SSAC in January.

“It’s extremely difficult for small triple-A schools to try to compete with an enrollment that’s 1,000 students less than the biggest schools in the class,” Dolan said. “We have classes to separate the schools by size, not to just separate the schools by number of schools.”

Nine schools that currently compete in Class AAA will move to Class AA, and six will move from Class AA to Class A…

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