The state's smallest football-playing classification will have a little more flexibility with its conference alignments if a proposal passes during the Arkansas Activities Association's annual meeting of the governing body next month.
Proposal No. 5 would allow the AAA to set the number of conferences and playoff qualifiers for Class 2A football based on the number of teams that will participate in the sport. Because it involves changing the AAA handbook, the proposal will need a two-thirds majority to pass, and would go into effect for the 2022-24 reclassification cycle.
"Class 2A is a different animal," Magazine Coach Ryan Chambers said. "It's completely different because you could have teams that may drop football for two years, then pick it back up in the next cycle. There's also the switching going on from 11-man football to 8-man football. It's also strange that you have Class 1A schools that play football, so they are in 2A."
The AAA handbook currently states that Class 2A football consists of six conferences comprised of the remaining schools after the bigger classifications have their allotted teams to complete their conferences. There were 42 schools in Class 2A when the recent conference alignments were done, but five schools -- Brinkley, Marianna, Midland, Rector and Spring Hill -- have since opted to play 8-man football because of low numbers.
Spring Hill's decision leaves the 2A-7 Conference with just five teams, meaning all of them will go to the playoffs next fall if football takes place. The 2A-4 Conference, with its eight original teams, is stretched out from Magazine to Yellville-Summit, and Chambers said his closest conference game is now Johnson County Westside in Coal Hill, which is an hour drive from Magazine.
"This proposal will give us some flexibility," AAA Executive Director Lance Taylor said. "With some of these conferences having just five or six teams, it means some schools have a Week Four or a Week Five open, and those are hard to fill if the bigger schools around them are already in conference play.
"With this proposal, we can set the number of conferences in Class 2A football by how many schools declare to play 11-man football. After we determine the number of conferences, we can also determine how many playoff qualifiers each conference will have in the next cycle."
The proposal also will help clear up an issue that arose for the first time during the current reclassification cycle. Class 5A football was left with 31 teams rather than the normal 32 when eStem -- a Little Rock charter school -- experienced such enrollment growth that it jumped into the bigger classification, even though it doesn't have a football team.
As a result, the 5A-South Conference will consist of seven football teams for the next two years, meaning an open date during conference play. Taylor said the proposal, if passed, allows the handbook to read that Class 5A will consist of the next 32 football-playing schools, and the wording will be changed to reflect all football-playing classifications.
"We never had a school that large not play football, and that is eStem's choice," Taylor said. "And who knows if eStem will continue to grow and eventually become a Class 6A or a Class 7A school. So this fixes this situation in the future.
"I received a lot of phone calls over this matter, especially from those schools in that conference. They are scrambling to find games because of that open date, and no game in that spot means schools lose revenue and other opportunities. I've also heard from those who say it's unfair because four out of seven in that conference go to the playoffs while four out of eight teams in the other conferences."
The AAA meeting with the governing body is scheduled for Aug. 3 in Little Rock.
Henry Apple can be reached at happle@nwadg.com or on Twitter @NWAHenry.