SBC soccer moves to single-division structure

Sandusky Bay Conference soccer will take on an altered structure this fall. Instead of the previous arrangement, which saw SBC boys and girls soccer split into Lake and Bay divisions, there will now just be one division for each gender. On the boys side, that means 11 teams in the competition — Clyde, Columbian, Edison, Huron, Norwalk, Old Fort, Perkins, Port Clinton, Sandusky, Willard and Vermilion. The girls league will feature 10 teams, including new addition Woodmore and without Old Fort and Willard. Teams will play each of their league foes once in a season, with the host alternating each year. "I think it makes the season more exciting and gives the kids more bragging rights," Perkins boys coach Paul Lea said. "It's one league table. We're all there. That's that." The realignment comes in conjunction with Oak Harbor's departure for the Northern Buckeye Conference. The Rockets had won the past four SBC Bay Division girls soccer titles and were a perennial power under long-time coach Renee Williamson, who stepped down after the 2021 season. The SBC's newest member, Woodmore, has had both boys and girls soccer for a long time. Their numbers resulted in a canceled boys season in 2023, though. The SBC could've kept a two-division structure in some form, but instead has gone with these all-in-one leagues. "We had discussed this before as coaches, from the old SBC to the new, and we actually wanted this for a while," Huron boys coach Matt Asher said. The jumbo-league structure, which includes what previously were crossover games, changes non-league scheduling for teams. "It makes more sense," Asher said. "A lot of us played each other as non-league games. We played Perkins, we played Vermilion, so it just would make more sense to play everybody once and have one SBC." This increases the stakes for some local matchups. Perkins usually has played Edison and Huron, for example, but those old SBC rivals were just crossover games the past few years. Now they'll return to their standing as league matchups. "I feel as if it brings back some rivalries," said Asher, who is entering his 18th season as the Tigers' coach. "There was still the rivalry, but now the rivalry matters for the SBC title." The Tigers and Pirates won't stage their season-opening matchup that had come to be a standard the week before football kicked off. Instead, Perkins will host Maumee in a girls-boys doubleheader on Friday, August 11. Huron's boys used a couple non-league schedule openings to challenge themselves. They open the season Saturday, August 12, at Delta, a 2 1/2-hour trip to play a team that didn't lose in the regular season in 2022. Port Clinton's girls followed a similar agenda, also adding Delta to their schedule along with Toledo Central Catholic. "(The realignment) allows us to make a little more of an argument if we're having a good season, should we be ranked in the state and things like that," Asher said. This is a departure from the general SBC schedules that call for home-and-home matchups in a given season (aside from football). That, at least in concept, allows a team to avenge an earlier loss that may have come while they weren't fully healthy or in great form. Now, a league championship could be decided by an early defeat for a team that doesn't get a chance to even the score later in the season. "I think it makes it a little bit more exciting, too," Asher said. "Injuries happen. People get sick. You've just got to roll with it." On the flip side, only playing every team once makes the highest-profile matchups huge games, even if they come in the first week or two of the season. "You challenge each of these teams one time," Asher said. "You have to put up your best every time, otherwise it's gonna be really hard to win that SBC championship, because there are definitely some good teams." The most notable additional point about the upcoming soccer season: Woodmore's girls soccer program is strong. The Wildcats were 16-4-1 last season and lost in a Division III regional final to Ottawa-Glandorf. They beat Oak Harbor during the 2022 regular season, 3-0. Woodmore returns two all-district players, Sage Perry and Azure Travis, who will both be seniors. Travis won state championships in both hurdles races at the 2023 state meet. "They've always been strong," said Paco Romero, who coaches Port Clinton's boys and girls teams. "I know Oak Harbor was usually the strongest in our (girls) conference. We'll wait and see." Woodmore's girls open their SBC era hosting Edison on Wednesday, August 23. They also will host Perkins the first time through the league, on Sept. 11, before traveling to Port Clinton on Sept. 13 in a stretch that could help decide the top of those standings. Norwalk's girls, another likely contender, play two huge games to close their league slate, going to Perkins on Sept. 27 and hosting Port Clinton on Oct. 2. "It's different because it's one and done," Romero said. "You go there and perform and if you don't perform, that's how it is." The first run through the boys SBC jumbo division could come all the way down to the wire. Perkins plays at Edison on Sept. 20, at Huron on Sept. 25 and concludes its league slate at home against Norwalk on Sept. 27. The Tigers don't wrap up SBC play until Oct. 11 at Port Clinton, their last game of the regular season. PC will also be involved in the title chase when it hosts Norwalk on Oct. 2. "It'll be awesome to see who is our outstanding performer as a merged two divisions," Romero said. "You'll basically have the best performer in our area." The Pirates are defending SBC champions from the Lake Division in girls soccer, while Perkins' boys shared last season's title with Norwalk. Edison made a late push past Huron to win the boys Bay last fall, while Oak Harbor departed as girls four-peat champions. Official soccer practices kick off July 31, fewer than two weeks before some teams play their first games. So soon enough, teams competing in the largest singular soccer divisions the SBC has ever had will be chasing the ultimate league championship. "I just think it's a better, more professional way of looking at it," Asher said. "Making it one league with all those teams makes it a little bit more prestigious." --- SBC Boys Soccer 2023 ClydeColumbianEdisonHuronNorwalkOld FortPerkinsPort ClintonSanduskyWillardVermilion SBC Girls Soccer 2023 ClydeColumbianEdisonHuronNorwalkPerkinsPort ClintonSanduskyVermilionWoodmore