The West Aurora District 129 School Board took the official step Tuesday evening to approve the move requested by the High School athletic director to join the Southwest Prairie Conference (SPC) in the 2019-2020 school year. Of the seven voting Board members, five voted in favor, one was against, and one person was not at the meeting.
West Aurora and Yorkville High School both were accepted by the Southwest Prairie Conference directors last Summer. The addition of two schools likely will mean two divisions of six schools each in the 12-team conference which includes Oswego, Oswego East, Plainfield’s Central, East, North, South, Romeoville, Minooka, and Joliet’s Central and West. Yorkville would have been without a conference next year following the break-up of the Northern Illinois Big 12. West Aurora’s absence will leave nine schools in the Upstate Eight, which could take DeKalb from the disbanded NIB12.
High school football items of importance:
• Neuqua Valley will play at Waubonsie Valley and Naperville North will play at Naperville Central in nonconference games of DuPage Valley Conference teams. The teams will play later in the season in conference games. Waubonsie Valley head coach Paul Murphy and North head coach Sean Drendel said nearly the same thing about the non-conference games: It does not change anything at all. It is a huge game against a rival.
• Waubonsie Valley, 2-0, rushed for 272 yards Friday in a 15-6 victory over Libertyville. North dropped to 0-2 after a second defeat to a top 10 team in the Chicago area, 41-24, to Batavia. “We are getting better and gaining confidence despite the two losses,” Drendel said.
• Marmion Academy, 2-0, on the heels of a one-point victory over rival Montini last year in Aurora, will play at the Broncos’ field in Lombard Friday. “They have nobody going both ways,” Marmion head coach Dan Thorpe said. “So we will wear down. Montini has a Division One running back (Nicholas Fedanzo).”
• “I keep (West Aurora) focused,” head coach Nate Eimer said, “because Streamwood easily could be 2-0.”