Rigdeland wins appeal, drops to AAA
The GHSA office in Thomaston was a busy place this past Wednesday as representatives from a number of schools all over the state were looking to appeal their recent classification reassignments for the upcoming two-year cycle.
A total of 34 of the 53 schools that appealed won their case to either move up or down from their newlyassigned classification, while 19 others were denied.
One of the schools that did win its appeal was Ridgeland, who will be playing in Class 3A for the next two school years (2022-2024). Ridgeland, who has been a Class 4A school since 2012, will all but assuredly join local rivals LFO, LaFayette and Ringgold in a northwest Georgia Class 3A region.
Tim Sparks, who took over as the school’s Athletic Director at the start of the school year back in August, made the presentation, which was approved by the Reclassification Committee by a 17-1 vote.
“I wasn’t overly hopeful, but I thought we had a very strong case,” said Sparks, who was participating in his first appeal hearing the GHSA. “I really didn’t know what to expect, but we’re super thrilled.”
When the GHSA released its preliminary reclassification list on Nov. 1, Ridgeland was the fifth-smallest school in the 4A classification, even with the adjusted enrollment now factoring in a 3.0 multiplier for out-ofzone students.
“Just being involved with the FTE (full-time equivalent) count up through October, we were kind of thinking our numbers were going to be close,” Sparks continued. “We’ve slowly trended down in our enrollment just a little bit and, although I didn’t know where that magic cutoff (between 3A and 4A) was going to be, I figured we might be close.
“Once the reclassification
(numbers) came out, it was kind of a no-brainer to at least go down there and make them tell me ‘no’ to my face. We had legitimate concerns and reasons for wanting to appeal and, being that we were so close to the bottom, it was worth it to make the drive down there.”
Sparks cited travel time and money as the two biggest reasons for wanting to move down a class.
“I think the biggest thing, logistically, was just the travel distance,” he explained. “Being in (Region 7-AAAA) with Cedartown, Central-Carroll and Pickens, those are three teams that are 80 miles away (one-way) and Central is 120 miles away. Just dropping
down, there’s going to be an immediate benefit in the travel time and the amount of time kids are on a bus.”
Sparks added that playing in 3A would also save the county money on travel expenses, especially with the current bus driver shortage, and that he believes the school will see an increase in gate receipts for home games as there will be shorter travel distances for fans of some opposing schools.
“I don’t think it’s going to be any easier in 3A,” he said of the level of competition the school will be leaving in 4A. “Still, we did this to give our kids a chance to have success and it just makes a lot of sense, logistically.”