LITTLE ROCK — After a three-hour hearing on Tuesday, a Pulaski County Circuit Judge Mary McGowan ordered briefs from the attorneys of the Bryant School District and the Arkansas Activities Association to be filed by Dec. 13. A ruling should come soon after that.
Bryant superintendent Randy Rutherford and Joe Couch, the superintendent from Bergman Schools who serves as the president of the AAA’s 20-member Board of Directors, testified briefly on Tuesday. Lance Taylor, the Executive Director of the AAA, spent most of the time testifying, primarily explaining to the judge the process by which it was decided that Bryant would be placed in a conference with Siloam Springs for the 2014-16 cycle. Siloam Springs is located on the Arkansas-Oklahoma border, west of Springdale, in the northwest corner of the state.
Bryant contends that the AAA violated its own policy regarding the geographic considerations in the assignment of the 32 largest schools to conferences. According to the original announcement by the Bryant School District, Section 6 – Athletic Conferences, Rule 1 of the 2013-14 AAA Handbook states,“The AAA Board of Directors assigns schools geographically to conferences for each two-year cycle. Schools may be in a conference other than indicated by the location of their county in an activity district. The largest 32 schools shall be assigned geographically to four conferences for regular season play in all applicable sports.”
It’s reported that Taylor emphasized the predicament of Siloam Springs, which has been competing as the lone Class 6A school in otherwise Class 7A West Conference, the power league in the state in many sports. Also, a primary focus was trying to get rid of the ratings system that has been used to seed teams from the four mixed conferences for postseason. West teams complained that Bryant, competing in the all 6A South Conference supplanted West teams the Hornets were seeded with, for higher seeding despite playing lesser competition. (Bryant’s football team was similarly supplanted when a member of the mostly 7A Central Conference a few years ago by a West Memphis team that was the only 7A team in the otherwise 6A East.)
It was also noted that the section of the handbook that Bryant pointed to has been amended to state that, in assigning the top 32 schools, an all 7A West and an all 6A South would be established with two other leagues mixed with four 7A and four 6A schools apiece. But Taylor admitted that addition was made after Bryant had filed suit.
Bryant is currently scheduled to compete in a revised Central Conference in the 2014-16 cycle that not only includes Siloam Springs but also Alma, Greenwood, Van Buren, Russellville, Conway and Little Rock Catholic.
