Section Realignment - Delta League To Return

The old Delta League, which comprised the Elk Grove-area schools along with Davis, Folsom and Jesuit/St. Francis High Schools, discarded in realignment of the Sac-Joaquin Section about seven years ago, may return. In today's first of what will be four league realignment meetings in Stockton, Section officials proposed the dissolution of the Delta Valley Conference and Delta River League beginning in the fall of 2014 and replace them with the Delta League.

In the proposal, Elk Grove, Franklin, Sheldon, Monterey Trail, Pleasant Grove, Jesuit/St. Francis, Grant and Davis would comprise the resurrected Delta League. There would also be two other Division I leagues in the north half of the Section, if the proposal is approved by the Section's Board of Governors later this spring.

The Sierra Foothill League, which currently has Del Oro, Rocklin, Granite Bay, Roseville, Woodcreek and Nevada Union, would add Folsom and Oak Ridge. Those two schools currently are part of the DRL.

The Monticello Empire League would be the Section's third Division I league in the North. Section officials also propose the MEL would contain Napa, Vintage, Rodriguez, Vallejo, Bethel and Vacaville.

In a bit of a surprise, both Laguna Creek and Cosumnes Oaks, a pair of Elk Grove Unified School District schools, would be placed in the Metropolitan Conference alongside of Florin and Valley, also EGUSD schools, plus Burbank, Kennedy, Johnson and McClatchy. The "Metro League" would be designated a Division III conference.

Another Division III league proposed would be the Capital Athletic League which would contain Casa Roble, Christian Brothers, El Camino, Sacramento, Oakmont, Placer and Vista del Lago.

The two proposed Division II leagues in the Section's north half would be Capital Valley Conference and the Solano County Athletic Conference.

To read the full proposal, click here

In his analysis, Section commissioner Pete Saco mentioned that growth of member schools has really slowed down. In fact, the SJS has added only two new schools in the past four years. Saco says for the period 2014 through 2018, there may be only two more high schools added to the Sac-Joaquin Section, which governs prep sports from Napa County east to the Sierra Nevada Mountains and from Yuba City/Marysville south to Merced.

Overall, the Section proposal would maintain the current structure of seven divisions and would reduced the total number of leagues from 27 to 26 with the dissolution of DVC and the DRL and the resurrection of the Delta League.