Photo Credit: Dion ClissoThere is always change during the offseason and this year is no different.
Most change is with coaches and every couple years leagues like the Suburban Conference reshuffle the deck among its different leagues.
This year those changes were on steroids. In the fall the Suburban Conference announced it was adding a new division going to five different leagues. Joining the Suburban Gold, Red, White and Blue is the Silver division. The split puts all the Conference’s Class 6 football schools into the Gold and Silver along with Staley and depending on where Staley falls in the upcoming classifications it could be 11 Class 6 schools.
Here is the full breakdown of the changes that include Excelsior Springs returning to Suburban Conference after almost two decades in Missouri River Valley Conference West. Suburban Conference Changes.
Other changes on the Missouri side include previous independent St. Michael joining the Crossroads Conference. The Guardians enter a league for the first time and gain some instant rivals in Summit Christian, University Academy and Van Horn.
On the Kansas side there was plenty of shakeups as well. The United Kansas Conference grew by three schools. Piper is moving over from the Frontier and will join some of its old Kaw Valley League partners Basehor-Linwood, Lansing and Turner. Also joining the UKC are Topeka Seaman and Topeka West giving the conference an even more western footprint.
Another Topeka school, Topeka Highland Park, is joining the five Kansas City Kansas School District schools and Atchison. The addition has sparked a change in the name of what was the Kansas City Atchison League or KCAL to the new Meadowlark Conference. That might take time to get used to but adding Highland Park should be good for all.
One final move on the Kansas side is Bishop Ward becoming an independent after being a member of the Crossroads the last four seasons.
Ok, that’s just the conferences and that is a lot of change but that pales in comparison to all the coaching changes. In all there were 34 coaching changes in the PrepsKC coverage area. That’s roughly a third of the schools changing coaches in one offseason.
There are a lot of new head coaches as always but there was also a lot of movement as well. There were also a few former coaches who have retired from one state and have been out of the area who have now returned. The two that stick out are Chip Sherman taking over Lincoln College Prep and Ron Litchfield returning to the Metro to take over Olathe South.
Here are all the coaching changes: 2022 Metro Coaching Changes
It is going to be an interesting year to say the least. Study up on all the changes and get ready for another great season of high school football in the Metro.
