Prairieland 2021

[Bresquire]

So with the emergence of 8 man football and teams leaving. The look for the Prairieland Conference may change dramatically.
Teams for the 2020 season going to 8 man - Peoria Heights, with North Fulton leaving for 8 man last season, that's two gone.
Lewistown and South Fulton both having trouble with numbers, looking at possible COOP or going 8 man in 21. Knoxville and Abingdon are leaving for the LTC in 21. So that leaves Elmwood, Farmington, Bushnell\WP, Havana in the Blue division. That leaves only Illini West for sure in the Black Division, with a possible COOP of Lewistown\SF or possibility of them going to 8 man.
If that happens, the conference would be down to 5 football teams. Not sure what that does for scheduling, but sounds like a challenge. Haven't heard of any schools in the area looking to jump, should be interesting... stay tuned.

Bresquire

[Leatherneck]

So with the emergence of 8 man football and teams leaving. The look for the Prairieland Conference may change dramatically.
Teams for the 2020 season going to 8 man - Peoria Heights, with North Fulton leaving for 8 man last season, that's two gone.
Lewistown and South Fulton both having trouble with numbers, looking at possible COOP or going 8 man in 21. Knoxville and Abingdon are leaving for the LTC in 21. So that leaves Elmwood, Farmington, Bushnell\WP, Havana in the Blue division. That leaves only Illini West for sure in the Black Division, with a possible COOP of Lewistown\SF or possibility of them going to 8 man.
If that happens, the conference would be down to 5 football teams. Not sure what that does for scheduling, but sounds like a challenge. Haven't heard of any schools in the area looking to jump, should be interesting... stay tuned.

Bresquire

Illini West--and Rushville-Industry--will also be leaving the Prairieland, this time to return to the West Central, in 2021, according to this article:

https://www.mcdonoughvoice.com/sports/2 ... scrambling

[Bresquire]

Update on Prairieland Conference football shifting. This season will remain the same with two divisions, same teams, minus Peoria Heights going to 8man football. 21\22 season conference will go back to one division, with Knoxville and ATown leaving for Lincoln Trail Conf. Rushville& Illini West will stay on for football only. West Hancock will be added for football only. Which will leave Prairieland with 9 teams. Plan is to have one crossover with LTC instead of 2. Hopefully that will stay for awhile, or possibly adding someone to make it a 10 team with two divisions...
This is of course if we have football this season...Stay safe out there.

Bresquire

[Leatherneck]

Rushville& Illini West will stay on for football only. West Hancock will be added for football only. Which will leave Prairieland with 9 teams.

Bresquire

So "West Central football" in 2021 will only consist of QND and Macomb?

Makes sense on R-I and IW's return to the WCC for the other sports (if indeed they are staying P-Land for football only).

Also, are Heights and North Fulton going to remain in the Prairieland for their other sports after moving to 8-man football?

(In addition, I have also heard that Peoria Christian and Heights are going to join the ICAC--which includes Brimfield, Elmwood and NF--for non-football sports--starting this coming season. Is Heights going to become the 4th dual ICAC/P-Land member or just switching solely to ICAC? Also, what about PCS--are they leaving the Tri-County to join the ICAC or becoming yet another dual conference member).

[wolverine55]

Has it been reported that West Hancock is officially in for 2021? I hadn’t seen that

[RedDevil]

(In addition, I have also heard that Peoria Christian and Heights are going to join the ICAC--which includes Brimfield, Elmwood and NF--for non-football sports--starting this coming season. Is Heights going to become the 4th dual ICAC/P-Land member or just switching solely to ICAC? Also, what about PCS--are they leaving the Tri-County to join the ICAC or becoming yet another dual conference member).
[/quote]

From my source, PH is ICAC only as is PCS

[nesland300]

Macomb and West Hancock will join the Prairieland Conference for the 2021 spring football season (assuming it happens). West Hancock will remain for football permanently, for Macomb it's a one year deal. There will be two divisions based on enrollment:
Large: Bushnell/West Prairie, Elmwood/Brimfield, Farmington, Knoxville, Macomb, West Hancock
Small: Abingdon/Avon, Havana, Illini West, Lewistown, Rushville/Industry, South Fulton
Weeks one and seven will be crossovers based on enrollment, the other five weeks will be in-division round robins.

Although it stresses this season's deal is temporary for Macomb, the KHQA article seems to tease the possibility of it being extended. I think that could work for the Prairieland, provided they can keep the right schools in the mix for the large/small split to work. If you can pull in a small school to replace A-Town (Brown County? Camp Point?) and a bigger school to replace Knoxville (QND? Beardstown?), plus maybe one more small school if/when Lewistown and South Fulton team up, I think it could settle into something workable for the longer term.

[tombs14]

Macomb and West Hancock will join the Prairieland Conference for the 2021 spring football season (assuming it happens). West Hancock will remain for football permanently, for Macomb it's a one year deal. There will be two divisions based on enrollment:
Large: Bushnell/West Prairie, Elmwood/Brimfield, Farmington, Knoxville, Macomb, West Hancock
Small: Abingdon/Avon, Havana, Illini West, Lewistown, Rushville/Industry, South Fulton
Weeks one and seven will be crossovers based on enrollment, the other five weeks will be in-division round robins.

Although it stresses this season's deal is temporary for Macomb, the KHQA article seems to tease the possibility of it being extended. I think that could work for the Prairieland, provided they can keep the right schools in the mix for the large/small split to work. If you can pull in a small school to replace A-Town (Brown County? Camp Point?) and a bigger school to replace Knoxville (QND? Beardstown?), plus maybe one more small school if/when Lewistown and South Fulton team up, I think it could settle into something workable for the longer term.

Any of those 4 teams are wayyyy to far outside of the region. You would see other teams leave if those were on the table.

Look for some of the teams closer to Peoria to go join/merge/work with the LTC.

[nesland300]

Macomb and West Hancock will join the Prairieland Conference for the 2021 spring football season (assuming it happens). West Hancock will remain for football permanently, for Macomb it's a one year deal. There will be two divisions based on enrollment:
Large: Bushnell/West Prairie, Elmwood/Brimfield, Farmington, Knoxville, Macomb, West Hancock
Small: Abingdon/Avon, Havana, Illini West, Lewistown, Rushville/Industry, South Fulton
Weeks one and seven will be crossovers based on enrollment, the other five weeks will be in-division round robins.

Although it stresses this season's deal is temporary for Macomb, the KHQA article seems to tease the possibility of it being extended. I think that could work for the Prairieland, provided they can keep the right schools in the mix for the large/small split to work. If you can pull in a small school to replace A-Town (Brown County? Camp Point?) and a bigger school to replace Knoxville (QND? Beardstown?), plus maybe one more small school if/when Lewistown and South Fulton team up, I think it could settle into something workable for the longer term.

Any of those 4 teams are wayyyy to far outside of the region. You would see other teams leave if those were on the table.

Look for some of the teams closer to Peoria to go join/merge/work with the LTC.

I think the Peoria area teams going more towards the LTC route is inevitable anyway. If/when that happens, the football map shifts west and south quite a bit.
I'll admit that QND and Camp Point are a stretch, but for most of the remaining schools, Beardstown and Brown County are actually either a shorter drive or roughly equal compared to Farmington or Elmwood/Brimfield. It looks like for Lewistown and Bushnell it would be a slight overall increase (by about 15-20 min), but for the other schools it's either pretty much dead-on equal or a decrease.

[Leatherneck]

[quote=nesland300 post_id=1559905 time=1597678485 user_id=26487]

Any of those 4 teams are wayyyy to far outside of the region. You would see other teams leave if those were on the table.

Look for some of the teams closer to Peoria to go join/merge/work with the LTC.

I think the Peoria area teams going more towards the LTC route is inevitable anyway. If/when that happens, the football map shifts west and south quite a bit.
[/quote]

I can defintely see E/B (and Elmwood and Brimfield for the other non-coop sports) bolt to the LTC if the P-Land expands all the way to the Quincy area. Individually they would fit perfectly geographically and enrollment-wise in the LTC (Brimfield 233; Elmwood 223). They would also probably stay in the ICAC for their other sports too.

Farmington will likely be a tough sell for most of the smallest LTC teams, with 429 students (Mercer County has 391 and at this time is by far the largest LTC member; BTW Knoxville is 358). I think due to enrollment the Farmers remain stuck in the Prairieland or a P-Land/West Central configuration (with the likes of Macomb, WH, IW, R-I, maybe Beardstown, in addition to the smaller PLand schools).

[nesland300]

The Bushnell/West Prairie coop is done after the 21-22 school year. https://www.mcdonoughvoice.com/news/202 ... st-prairie
Locally, the word is that Bushnell will likely go 8-man for football. I'm guessing West Prairie almost certainly will too. That would leave Prairieland football with:
Havana
South Fulton
Lewistown
Farmington
Elmwood-Brimfield
Illini West (football only after 20-21)
Rushville-Industry (football only after 20-21)
West Hancock (football only)

An 8 team league looks okay for now, but things start to look dicey if anyone else goes 8-man and/or the West Central starts doing something for football and pulls away those football-only members. There have been rumblings of Lewistown eventually joining the South Fulton coop too, which would also drop one team from the mix.

[nesland300]

Macomb has reportedly been invited as a full member (all sports) starting in 21-22. I was okay with this for football only on a temporary/semi-temporary basis, but for all sports I don't know. This feels like desperation from a conference that's losing members.

[nesland300]

Macomb BOE officially accepted the invite last night. That leaves Prairieland football looking like:
Bushnell-West Prairie (coop ends after next year, neither school likely to play 11 man after that)
Elmwood-Brimfield
Farmington
Havana
Illini West (football only)
Lewistown
Macomb
Rushville-Industry (football only)
South Fulton
West Hancock (football only)

[justdoit69]

Macomb has reportedly been invited as a full member (all sports) starting in 21-22. I was okay with this for football only on a temporary/semi-temporary basis, but for all sports I don't know. This feels like desperation from a conference that's losing members.

I'm struggling to see how this move benefits either side.

[nesland300]

Macomb has reportedly been invited as a full member (all sports) starting in 21-22. I was okay with this for football only on a temporary/semi-temporary basis, but for all sports I don't know. This feels like desperation from a conference that's losing members.

I'm struggling to see how this move benefits either side.

It benefits Macomb more than it benefits the rest of the conference. The KHQA interview made it sound like it took a lot of begging for them to finally get an invite. It makes filling out their football schedule much easier, and in other sports they will generally have waaaaay less travel than before. I'm sure it will also be nice for them to be the biggest school in the conference by a pretty wide margin.

For the PLC, like I said before, the conference was looking to be in hot water pretty soon when it came to football if they didn't retain/bring in as many teams as they could. The last couple of years teams have been leaving or going to 8 man left and right. This helps explain why they finally said yes to Macomb and (for football only) West Hancock after doing their best to keep them out in the past. I also hear Macomb's student section travels well, so that's a good payday for these small schools when Macomb comes to town for football or basketball.

That all being said, I think we'll have to see what happens with conference membership a few years down the road when the smaller schools get tired of getting trounced by Macomb in every sport every year.

[wolverine55]

No offense...but even given the enrollment disparity, is Macomb currently good enough in any of their sports to "trounce" all of these teams repeatedly?

[nesland300]

No offense...but even given the enrollment disparity, is Macomb currently good enough in any of their sports to "trounce" all of these teams repeatedly?

At the moment not really (which probably contributed to the decision to invite them), but given how wide the disparity is I think it's foolish of the other schools to count on the downturn lasting long term. Even in their current state I think only the higher tier teams in this conference will regularly be competitive with them in most sports.

[justdoit69]

No offense...but even given the enrollment disparity, is Macomb currently good enough in any of their sports to "trounce" all of these teams repeatedly?

At the moment not really (which probably contributed to the decision to invite them), but given how wide the disparity is I think it's foolish of the other schools to count on the downturn lasting long term. Even in their current state I think only the higher tier teams in this conference will regularly be competitive with them in most sports.

Most schools in the conference will probably never be able to consistently with Macomb. Maybe 2(ish) teams would be able to compete with Macomb even in a down year.

[nesland300]

No offense...but even given the enrollment disparity, is Macomb currently good enough in any of their sports to "trounce" all of these teams repeatedly?

At the moment not really (which probably contributed to the decision to invite them), but given how wide the disparity is I think it's foolish of the other schools to count on the downturn lasting long term. Even in their current state I think only the higher tier teams in this conference will regularly be competitive with them in most sports.

Most schools in the conference will probably never be able to consistently with Macomb. Maybe 2(ish) teams would be able to compete with Macomb even in a down year.

Yep. With Knoxville gone and IW out except for football, I think in most sports most years the title will come down to Macomb or Farmington. Other schools will certainly have their moments, but this makes the conference overall much less competitive for the foreseeable future.

Another thing to note: The four schools that are leaving as Macomb comes in are 4 out of the 6 current biggest schools in the conference. That makes the enrollment gap even bigger than it appears at first glance right now. There will be a gap of about 150 between Macomb and Farmington, and then almost 150 from Farmington to Havana. No way this lasts long term unless they can bring in enough schools for true large/small divisions with separate championships.