High school football is exploding in Maine. It’s growing more quickly here than anywhere else in the country, to be precise.

What should the state’s sports sanctioning body do about it? That’s where the dispute begins.

The Maine Principals Association has asked its football committee to examine the possibility of expanding football from three to four classes. Initially, there was talk of change as early as next season. MPA officials sent a memorandum to member schools in September. It discussed the possible reasons for realignment and included a rough sketch of how the new divisions might look under current enrollment figures.

That electronic mailing triggered a loud reaction from Kittery to Millinocket as member schools jockeyed for position to protect their competitive interests, travel costs and traditions.

“Changes comes hard in anything,” said Larry LaBrie of Auburn, assistant executive director of the MPA.

Football committee members were asked to gather feedback after last month’s announcement. The group met Friday in Augusta to review its findings and weigh the possibility of a vote at the MPA spring conference in April.

The plan was rejected. That didn’t come as a surprise to one spokesman who predicted before the meeting that the issue was “dead in the water.”

One spokesman already believes the issue is “dead in the water.”

“My gut feeling is that it isn’t going to fly right now,” said Lisbon High School co-curricular director Jeff Ramich, who was appointed to the football committee in September. “I think we need to get to 80 teams before something like this will work.”

Sixty-seven schools are playing varsity football this fall. Eighty sounds like an impossible threshold until you consider the growth in the last decade-and-a-half.

Only 55 Maine schools fielded a varsity team in 1990. Since then, the addition of Bonny Eagle, Mt. Ararat, Scarborough, Windham, Gorham, Gray-New Gloucester, Greely, Falmouth, Cape Elizabeth, Poland, Maranacook and Dirigo has swelled the ranks by a staggering 22 percent.

Nokomis and Yarmouth could be ready to tackle the varsity ranks next year. And there are active developmental programs at Monmouth, Mount View, Buckfield, Telstar, Freeport, Central-East Corinth, Camden Hills, Lincoln Academy and Presque Isle.

“It’s a Maine thing. It’s bringing back football to a lot of communities that had it and missed it,” said Norman Thombs, coach of a Monmouth Academy program that could be ready for Class C or D competition by 2008. “A lot of parents played football. The parents see the value of the sport. They wanted their sons, and in the case of our junior high program their daughters, to have that experience.”

The translation of America’s most popular televised sport to real life creates happy problems. Schools and administrators are happy to see more students able to participate in a fall activity, but they’re also worried that football will put the squeeze on established programs such as soccer and cross country.

Then, at the state level, there’s the reclassification issue.

In its memo, the MPA noted that Maine is one of the few states in the country that currently awards only three football championships. Depth and sheer student numbers are more of an asset in football than other sports, and the current, three-class system leaves some schools trying to compete with league rivals who have several hundred extra students roaming the halls.

Realignment could address that issue slightly, but some coaches say it would only create new inequities. Under the rejected proposal, for instance, Leavitt Area High School of Turner would have dropped from the second-largest Class B school to one of the smallest.

“I’m not sure how I feel about us playing Lawrence, Mt. Blue, Marshwood and Kennebunk,” Leavitt coach Mike Hathaway said.

Football’s growth mirrors Maine’s economic and population base, in that it is limited almost exclusively to the southern corridor of the state.

Reclassification of the sport became a hot-button issue two years ago when Gary Parlin, head coach at Mt. Blue, proposed a four-class structure to address the growing disparity in Class A. His suggestion gained further momentum, coincidentally, when Parlin’s Cougars (enrollment 848) were soundly beaten by the Bonny Eagle Scots (enrollment 1,212) in the Class A final last November.

Critics contend that most supporters of the newest proposal embrace it because it benefits their school.

“I don’t think it makes sense to change the entire system just so the Pine Tree Conference (now Eastern Class A) can win a state championship,” Hathaway said.

The gap between East and West (or north and south) may be more cultural than numerical. Many football observers were surprised when the MPA enrollment figures showed that the two largest high schools in the state, Bangor and Lewiston, are part of the beleaguered Eastern division of Class A.

In fact, five of the top nine schools on the list hail from the side that has lost 18 of the last 19 Class A title games. Oxford Hills, Edward Little and Brunswick all boast more than 1,100 students. That’s roughly 250 more than Gorham, which has been one of the dominant teams in the West this fall.

Gorham would have become a Class B school under the most recent proposal, although in any scenario schools would be given the option of petitioning to play in a higher class.

“This isn’t only an enrollment issue. It’s consistency in not only your program but your coaching staff,” Ramich said. “Look at Bonny Eagle. They started off with a different coach every year. When I was on the coaching staff at Oxford Hills, we were pounding them. But then Kevin Cooper came along as coach and got a couple of wins here and there, got them into the playoffs the first time, and now they’re a perennial.”

Travel also was considered a possible negative impact of the MPA recommendation. Only five Eastern schools – Mattanawcook of Lincoln, Stearns of Millinocket, Foxcroft, Orono and Dexter – would remain in the small-school division, with nine in the West. Presumably it would result in an uneven, crossover schedule and hundreds of extra interstate miles for road-weary teams.

LaBrie hears the objections, but he believes it is crucial to advance the discussion sooner than later in light of football’s dramatic growth.

“We could be talking about the same situation two years from now, when there could be as many as three or four new teams ready,” he said.

Friday’s committee verdict doesn’t mean that the discussion is finished. Football being the emotional game it is, insiders worry that the ongoing debate will be a contentious one.

“I hope it isn’t. It really shouldn’t be,” said Ramich. “Going to four classes will be a great idea. Someday.”

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