Western Cascade Conference in jeopardy

Capital High School made the switch to 3A, and to the Western Cascade Conference, in the 2006 school year. Now, a year and a half later, another shakeup: football powerhouse Lakes is gone (oh, well), as is Clover Park (no big loss), both jumping ship to the South Puget Sound league. Once Shelton completes its move to 4A by joining the Narrows League (which means they can establish a new rivalry with Olympia), four teams remain: Capital, North Thurston, Timberline, and Yelm. Looking at the present alignments, there's no easy answer to the question:

Where do we go from here?

Update 1/8 Today's article outlines some of the options.

The four Thurston County schools have applied to be part of the SPSL in hopes of the league having two divisions, Olympia School District athletic director Jeff Carpenter said.

"We have to see if the SPSL is interested," Carpenter said. "If they're not interested, we'll go to a split league."

That split league would be a 3A/2A split with the four remaining Class 3A WCC schools and possibly the five schools in the Class 2A Nisqually League, Carpenter said.

Another option down the line would be a 4A/3A split league, bringing in Olympia and Shelton, he said.

"At this point, we're looking at a few options," Carpenter said. "We're looking to do this as quickly as possible."

Update 1/11: The SPSL isn't interested. 27 schools, apparently, is enough for them. No word on what happens next.