Why NUIC voted no to co-op and how that could spell death to Aquin high school sports

Two of the smallest schools in the NUIC won’t co-op in girls basketball next year. Six schools double their size voted it down.

That could spell the end to Freeport Aquin’s sports programs. Or worse.

“The doors might not even be open next year,” Freeport Aquin athletic director Todd Kramer said. “Sports play a huge role in a kid’s life. If the girls at the elementary and junior high level see there are no sports here, you force them to make a decision whether they want to stay at your school.”

Aquin learned that the hard way. Fifteen football players transferred to other schools last year when the local 8-man league voted Aquin had to wait a year to co-op with Orangeville in football. That left Aquin, the only private school in the league, with only 20 boys in the entire school this year.

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The NUIC voted to let Aquin co-op with Orangeville (102 students in the top four grades) in boys basketball this year. Barely. Four of the 21 schools in the league's three divisions voted no. Lena-Winslow, Forreston, Eastland and Galena — the four schools with the most successful overall sports programs in the NUIC — all said no.

“We have always voted no based on our beliefs on not having a boundary and a non-boundary school co-op,” Forreston athletic director Kyle Zick said.

Co-ops are common in the NUIC. Scales Mound, the only school smaller than Aquin and Orangeville in the NUIC’s three divisions, has had a co-op with River Ridge in every sport except boys basketball and girls volleyball for decades. Orangeville and Aquin no co-op together in every boys sport, plus all junior high and elementary sports for both boys and girls. They were also unanimously approved to co-op in girls softball — Orangeville's only historically dominant sport — four years ago and took third in the state in 2021. Even the four league powers that voted no often co-op.

“Those four schools combined have 18 to 20 co-ops between them,” Orangeville girls basketball coach Jay Doyle said. “And our enrollment next year is 88 and Aquin’s is 40. We’ll have 128 kids. Eastland has 199, Lena’s is 239, Forreston is 239 and Galena is 242.”

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Two even larger schools ultimately sank the girls basketball co-op. Pecatonica (270 students) and Dakota (258) voted yes for the boys basketball co-op but no for the girls. Dakota superintendent Nik Butenhoff said his school "is supportive of co-ops overall, but we look at each co-op proposal individually." He said the girls basketball co-op didn't make as good of a case for their need as the boys did, but would not go into specifics.

It’s easy to guess why.

Even with the co-op, Orangeville/Aquin is 6-16 in boys basketball this year. But in girls basketball, Orangeville (26-1) will win its third straight conference title and is ranked second in the state in Class 1A. Aquin (19-5) was ranked No. 8 at the time of the vote and has one of the great freshmen players in area history in NCAA Division I recruit Paityn London.

“People think if we combine we will be a powerhouse,” Aquin’s Kramer said. “They are not looking at the big picture. Without this co-op, our kids won’t have an opportunity to play. All these schools see is the stigmatism of private schools. We’re just trying to survive.”

The co-op starts next year, not this year. When Whitney Sullivan has already graduated. Orangeville had 20 consecutive losing seasons before the 6-3 Tulsa recruit joined the team as a freshman. Orangeville won't be the same without her. Aquin will also be much different last year, graduating every regular except for London.

“Look at our track record," Orangeville's Doyle said. "We averaged five wins for 17 or 18 years. We are trying to take Aquin in because they need to play. Just like their boys need it. And we’re both going to need it down the road.”

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Aquin girls basketball coach Josh Glawe said it is “50-50” whether the Bulldogs can field a team next year if the conference doesn't change its mind about the co-op.

“We would definitely have to try to get some kids out who haven’t been playing but maybe played in junior high,” he said. “Even then, if anyone had an injury or got sick, it would be tough to have enough players for a team.”

Aquin’s athletic director said every current Bulldog has attended Aquin since they were in grade school and the current junior high team has only one eighth-grader — and zero sixth-graders.

“The numbers don’t lie. If everybody stays, we would have five players next year," Kramer said. "The following year we would have six players. The year after that, down to five. Four years from now we would have seven. And that’s if everything went perfect and we kept everybody.”

Kramer said the threat of no girls basketball opportunities will also likely sink Aquin’s volleyball team. Aquin has gone 107-13 in volleyball the last three years, including a Class 1A state title in 2022 and a state third-place trophy in 2021.

“If the girls basketball co-op doesn’t go through,” Kramer said, “the girls who play both sports will leave and then they won’t have a volleyball team next year. They are going to do what their boys all did and leave. Then you don’t have a school.”

Aquin and Orangeville say this is all about playing, not winning. Most of the conference is on their side.

“We just want to give a kids a chance to play,” Amboy principal Janet Crownhart said. “If schools need to co-op to give their kids a chance to play, we are for it.”

Galena and East Dubuque, two of the largest schools in the conference, recently formed a wrestling co-op, which was approved unanimously. Durand and Pecatonica formed a football co-op in 2017 and with 450 combined students has made the Class 3A playoffs three years in a row playing in a mostly 1A conference. That made Du/Pec four times as large as Orangeville, which dropped down to 8-man five years later.

“We voted for it. Was that fair for our football team?” Doyle asked. “They have plenty of enrollment to (field a team); they just don’t do it. Do you say tough? No, it doesn’t matter how many students they have because they can’t field a team. That’s the right way to do it.

“We’re the smallest school and we have never voted no when a co-op has come up for a school that was struggling for numbers. It’s all about the kids playing.”

The entire NUIC has that attitude. For public schools. But private schools clearly have a competitive advantage. Boylan in the NIC-10, Rockford Lutheran in the Big Northern and Aquin in the NUIC have had strong sports programs for decades despite being among the smallest schools in their conferences. State-wide, private schools win state titles at over double the rate of public schools. Nation-wide, too. Some rivals are leery of giving private schools another advantage, even when that school has grown as small as Aquin.

“It’s simply our philosophy,” Lena-Winslow superintendent Tom Chiles said. “Any time we’ve had a non-boundary school trying to co-op with a public school, we don’t think that’s appropriate. We have been consistent voting that way any time that’s been proposed.”

Contact: mtrowbridge@rrstar.com, @matttrowbridge or 815-987-1383. Matt Trowbridge has covered sports for the Rockford Register Star for over 30 years, after previous stints in North Dakota, Delaware, Vermont and Iowa City.

This article originally appeared on Rockford Register Star: Why NUIC denied Orangeville/Aquin girls basketball co-op; what now?