MANSFIELD — The conference carousel began spinning again last week, putting the Ohio Cardinal Conference in flux once more.
The Mount Vernon school board voted Nov. 21 to accept an invitation to join the Licking County League beginning with the 2024-25 school year. The move will end Mount Vernon’s almost decade-long affiliation with the OCC.
“While we were not actively seeking a new conference, the Licking County League sent an official invitation for Mount Vernon to join the LCL in the fall,” Mount Vernon athletic director Justin Sanford said. “After careful consideration and discussion amongst the board of education, superintendent, and coaches, the decision was ultimately decided to pursue this new direction for our programs and schools.”
Mount Vernon will become the LCL’s 12th member school. The conference is divided into big-school and small-school divisions with Mount Vernon joining Licking Heights, Licking Valley, Granville, Watkins Memorial and Zanesville in the Buckeye (big-school) Division. LCL Cardinal Division members include Heath, Lakewood, Utica, Northridge, Johnstown and Newark Catholic.
The OCC, meanwhile, finds itself searching for another new member. The conference achieved a measure of stability at the start of this school year when New Philadelphia came on board as the eighth member school. The OCC had operated as a seven-member conference beginning in the fall of 2017 after Clear Fork left for the Mid-Ohio Athletic Conference.
OCC officials took their time in finding a replacement for Clear Fork, searching for a school that matched the current membership’s athletic, academic and enrollment profiles. The same measured approach will be employed in finding Mount Vernon’s successor.
“It’s going to take a little time to settle in and we’ll go from there,” OCC commissioner Ron Dessecker said. “I think most of the schools in the conference would want to have an eight-member conference. Eight makes a nice, tidy league.
“When you think about a seven-school situation, you’re going to have at least one open date within the (football) schedule that you have to fill. It gets extremely difficult for schools to find a similar opponent.”
Mount Vernon’s announcement came as a surprise, league officials said. Athletic administrators from the other OCC school have met to discuss their next move and will re-convene before the holiday break.
“I don’t think any of us really saw it coming,” Madison athletic director Doug Rickert said. “Madison’s stance is we are not rushing to judgement. We’re going to see where we are and what is available. Every option is on the table right now.
“People are asking, ‘Are you going to take this team or that team?’ Everybody wants us to make a decision right now and we need to sit back and let it digest a little bit.”
Cardinal Conference Reboot?
Longtime area high school sports fans saw New Philadelphia’s admission to the OCC as a harbinger of a partial reformation of the original Cardinal Conference. The CC, which was formed in 1960 and dissolved in 1987, included current OCC members Madison, Ashland, Wooster and New Philadelphia, along with Malabar (before its consolidation with Mansfield Senior), Dover and Coshocton.
Malabar withdrew from the CC in 1981 and competed as an independent before requesting re-admission to the Cardinal Conference, along with Mansfield Senior. Dover, New Philadelphia and Wooster opposed the move, which led to the CC’s demise and gave rise to the Ohio Heartland Conference for the 1987-88 school year.
The original OHC lineup included Mansfield Senior, Malabar, Madison, Lexington, Ashland and Marion Harding. Senior High and Malabar consolidated after the 1988-89 school year, leaving the OHC with five members. Orrville and Vermilion joined the OHC for the 1999-2000 school year, but the seven-member OHC lasted just four years before disbanding.
OHC members Mansfield Senior, Madison, Lexington, Ashland and Orrville joined Wooster and West Holmes to form the Ohio Cardinal Conference in the fall of 2003. Wooster found refuge in the Federal League after the original Cardinal Conference’s break-up while West Holmes came to the OCC from the Mohican Area Conference. Fellow MAC member Clear Fork joined the OCC in the fall of 2004.
A decade of conference stability followed before Orrville left the OCC for the Principals Athletic Conference in the fall of 2016. Orrville’s departure cleared the way for the addition of Mount Vernon for the 2016-17 school year, but the growing enrollment disparity between the OCC’s biggest and smallest schools prompted Clear Fork to begin searching for a conference with more like-sized schools.
Clear Fork found a home in the reconfigured Mid-Ohio Athletic Conference beginning in the fall of 2017. The OCC operated as a seven-team conference while searching for Clear Fork’s replacement and eventually extended an invitation to New Philadelphia in April of 2020.
New Philadelphia accepted the OCC’s invitation with the understanding the school would continue to play Dover in Week 10 of the football season. The New Philadelphia-Dover rivalry is among the oldest in the state, dating to 1896. The teams met for the 119th time this fall.
Dover bounced around in its search for a stable conference home after the original Cardinal Conference fractured, first in the now-defunct Senate League (1987-89) and then in the Northeastern Buckeye Conference (1989-93) before landing in the East Central Ohio League in the fall of 1993. The ECOL disbanded following the 2021-22 school year, forcing Dover to operate as an independent this school year.
The school has applied to the OCC, according to an open letter authored by high school principal Brooke Grafe and athletic director Tim McCrate and published on the Dover City Schools website in August.
“As principal and athletic director, we are stewards of our school’s athletic program. It is our responsibility to Dover students and our school community to cast a wide net and explore each and every option,” Grafe and McCrate said in the letter. “Leagues evolve over time; by nature, they are dynamic and fluid.”
‘No School Checks Every Box’
The calculus seems simple enough. The OCC is in need of an eighth member and Dover is looking for a stable, long-term conference home. Dover’s biggest rival and Week 10 football opponent is an OCC affiliate and the school has a long history with several OCC schools. Its enrollment is similar, its athletic programs are competitive and its facilities are comparable.
It’s not that simple, however, as other factors are in play — not the least of which is travel time. Both Dover and New Philadelphia are situated in Tuscarawas County, more than 65 miles from the OCC’s Richland County affiliates.
“Mansfield Senior is looking for what every other OCC member is looking for — a school that is comparable in size and student make-up and a school that will be competitive,” Senior High athletic director Kevin Porter said. “In a perfect world we’d love to have every school within an hour, but that’s just not where we’re at right now.
“No school checks every box.”
OCC bylaws allow for one dissenting vote when adding new members to the roster, meaning six of the seven current affiliates would have to vote yes for a school to gain admission to the conference.
“It’s not ideal for our league to be at seven members, but I also understand trying to find a school that’s a good fit,” Ashland athletic director Jason Goings said. “I’m just not sure if that school exists. Having been through this once before, I anticipate it not being an easy process.”
As the OCC’s commissioner for 20 years, Dessecker has helped the conference navigate membership upheaval in the past. This isn’t the first time the conference has searched for a new affiliate and it won’t be the last.
“As I’ve said many times before, nothing lasts forever,” Dessecker said. “Things happen. We will move forward and do what is best for our current membership.”