Updated: JC girls return to 3A

INDIANAPOLIS — Change is coming for four Patriot and three Starfire sports teams.

The IHSAA announced today the reclassification for the 2017-18 and 2018-19 school years.

Jay County High School’s girls basketball and volleyball teams, which have been in Class 4A since the 2007-08 school year, will drop to Class 3A for the next two seasons. The Patriot boys and girls soccer teams will also see a change as the IHSAA moves to a three-class system, while the JCHS boys basketball squad remains Class 4A.

“That’s exciting,” said Kirk Comer, Jay County’s girls basketball coach. “When you’re in the Homestead sectional and one of the smallest schools in (Class 4A) it’s hard to compete.”

The JCHS enrollment for the 2017-18 and 2018-19 school years is 1,060 students, making the Patriot girls basketball team the second-largest school in Class 3A behind Fort Wayne Bishop Dwenger’s 1,075.

South Bend St. Joseph’s (896 students), North Harrison (689) and and Heritage Christian (407) all have enrollments smaller than Jay County, but moved up to Class 4A because of the IHSAA’s tournament success factor.

This means Jay County’s girls basketball team, which has won three straight Allen County Athletic Conference tournament titles, had a 55-19 record in the last three seasons and has not won a sectional title since 2006, will have new sectional rivals.

“Obviously we don’t know what direction to go yet,” Comer said. Sectional alignments for all sports will be announced in May. “Whichever direction we go there are going to be really good teams.

“It’s not like it’s going to be really easy to get through sectional. At least we’re going to have a chance to compete for sectional championships.”

Homestead, which was the Class 4A state champion this year, has won the sectional title in each of the last three seasons.

The last three sectional championships for the JCHS girls program came in a four-year span from 2003 through ’06 while the Patriots were in Class 3A. The last of those was with Comer at the helm.

The Jay County volleyball team also dropped to Class 3A, and is the third-largest school in the class behind Kankakee Valley (1,083), which also dropped a class, and Bishop Dwenger.

The last time the Patriot volleyball team won sectional was in 2002 as a Class 3A school.

Beginning this fall, boys and girls soccer will be divided into three classes, up from the previous two-class format. Jay County’s boys and girls soccer teams will be placed in Class 2A.

The boys team, which last won a sectional title in 2015, is the largest school in the class, ahead of Columbia City (1,056), Marion (1,053) and Northview (1,024).

Jay County’s girls soccer team — it won back-to-back sectional titles in 2014 and 2015 — is the 13th-largest school in the class.

“I am thrilled at the chance to maybe play a different sectional, to see different teams (and) to build new rivalries,” said JCHS soccer coach Giles Laux.

Jay County played its sectional tournament at Yorktown with the host Tigers, the Delta Eagles and Muncie Central Bearcats. The Tigers and Eagles are both also Class 2A, while the Bearcats were placed in Class 3A.

“If we stay in the Yorktown area, great,” Laux said. “We’re not afraid to play anyone and we look forward to who we get set up to play. It’s going to be business as usual.”

Jay County’s boys basketball team is once again at the low end of Class 4A enrollment. It is the second-smallest of the group of 101. Columbia City is the smallest school in the class.

The South Adams boys and girls soccer teams will be Class 1A while the defending sectional champion Starfire football team drops to Class 1A as well.

“I’m really interested to see where we’re going to go,” said SAHS football coach Grant Moser, whose team upset Class 2A No. 1 Woodlan on its way to a sectional title this season. South Adams won Class 1A sectional titles in 2013 and 2014, including a regional championship in 2014.. “At the end of the day I like that we play bigger schools during the season. It prepares us for the smaller sectional.”