The Columbia Basin Big Nine Athletic Conference athletic directors met in an all-day session Wednesday in Moses Lake.
The meeting didn't break up until 5 p.m., leaving league secretary Loren Sandhop, the Moses Lake AD, a little punch-drunk.
"I've been staring at a computer screen the whole time, taking the minutes, figuring out schedules," Sandhop said. "I'm exhausted."
But from the meeting emerged the framework for the CBBN's schedules for the next two years.
In football and the 20-game sports (boys and girls basketball, baseball and softball), the league agreed upon a two-division format. In all other sports, including the 16-game team sports (boys and girls soccer, volleyball), a single-slate schedule will be used, with teams playing on a two-year, home-and-home rotation.
The divisions, drawn randomly but with geographical pools, look as follows (the division names are not set in stone):
American -- Davis, Pasco, Wenatchee, Kennewick, Sunnyside, Southridge and Moses Lake.
National -- Eisenhower, Eastmont, Kamiakin, Richland, Hanford, West Valley, Walla Walla, Chiawana (joining in 2009).
In Year 1 of the two-year scheduling cycle for football, Week 1 will be an open week for teams to play whomever they wish. Weeks 2-8 will be for intradivisional play, with bye weeks matched for rivalry games (Davis-Ike, Wenatchee-Eastmont, Kamiakin-Kennewick, etc.).
Week 9 will be for divisional crossovers to determine regional qualifiers. Week 10 will be for crossover games with the Greater Spokane League.
Year 2 will be similar, but with Chiawana added, that eliminates the bye week in the National Division, leaving the seven American teams to find one-year fill-in games.
Like in the current CBL format, crossover games against the other division will not count toward determining division championships.
Still to be determined are details such as how to work in tournaments into wrestling and tennis schedules, how to work all the league meets around WASL testing, etc.
That the fall schedules for 2008 were figured out and that ADs can now go hunting for nonleague games was key. The rest could be saved for another marathon session.
One other tidbit: Moses Lake senior Jarred Walker has decided to forego a scholarship at EWU to instead be an invited walk-on at WSU. Wonder how much Paul Wulff leaving EWU for the Palouse affected this decision.
Til next time ...