CCSD’s path to football independence more complex than just Gorman

The complex and never-ending saga of Nevada high school football realignment is like a Rubik’s Cube.

There are plenty of blue and orange spots to represent Bishop Gorman’s football dominance. But there are other issues that boiled over in recent football realignment discussions that appear to have led all involved parties to a crossroads with seemingly no right solution.

Clark County School District principals have taken matters into their own hands by pulling their football programs out of the Nevada Interscholastic Activities Association, leading 30 programs in Southern Nevada to play as independents over the next two seasons.

Another offseason filled with realignment drama — of a potential format change midalignment cycle and a threat of legal action by Bishop Gorman lawyers — along with Gorman’s return to a national powerhouse, the rise of charter schools and changes at CCSD have led to the drastic change for the 30 teams.

“Something needs to be done,” Liberty football coach and co-athletic director Rich Muraco said Wednesday night. “Unfortunately, this is one of those situations where you got to kind of take a stand and maybe cause some real change in the future.

“That’s what I’m hoping happens, that how our state looks at things and says, ‘OK, well, how do we really address this problem?’ ”

Change will leave Bishop Gorman and Faith Lutheran, the only Southern private schools in the 5A/4A classification, and charter schools such as Sloan Canyon, SLAM! Nevada, Mater East and Losee as the only Southern schools that can compete for recognized Nevada state titles.

“All of our players at the charter and private schools all play with these kids (at public schools), and they really enjoy the competitive nature of all the games that we’ve played,” Faith Lutheran coach Jay Staggs said. “That part of it, I think, is sad.

“We’ve enjoyed some great defeats and some great victories, and there were plenty of lessons to go along with both sides right where our program (was playing against CCSD schools).”

‘It’s just different now’

Things have changed drastically from when Liberty upset Gorman in the 2019 4A Desert Region title game and went on to win the state title. That’s the only title in the top classification not won by Gorman in the last 17 years.

CCSD has eliminated open enrollment that allows any student to attend any public school in the district. Now, students are only allowed to attend a public high school they are zoned for. In contrast, students in Southern Nevada can attend private schools such as Gorman or Faith Lutheran, or any charter school regardless of where they live.

“It’s different than when we beat Gorman in 2019,” Muraco said. “We had zone variances. We had open enrollment prior to that. Families made a decision that ‘I want my kid to go to Liberty.’ They fill out the zone variance paperwork, and they were granted it.

“It allowed us to get a few kids that were talented and enough to kind of close the gap. But it’s just different now.”

There are also NIAA transfer rules that allow any student who is transferring from a public school to a charter school to become immediately eligible to play at the charter school. Conversely, students who transfer from charter or private schools to public schools have to sit out a year.

CCSD also enforces a holdback rule for students who are held back in middle school; they are placed in the grade they are supposed to be in at a CCSD school.

“This is also a lot to do with the charter schools. It’s not just a Gorman issue,” Muraco said. “The Mater East, the Sloan Canyons, the SLAMs. They have an unfair advantage of being able to get kids in there.

“Those are the schools that are pulling kids away from a lot of the midtier programs that would be better.”

‘What’s our options?’

Things came to ahead at the end of the season when the NIAA revealed its final rankings for a radical new HRM point rating system that determined which 5A and 4A Southern teams made the playoffs, and which 5A Southern teams would qualify for the Open Division.

The system combined MaxPreps rankings, Harbin Points and NIAA rubric points to determine an HRM score to rank teams. The first change came after an unexpected update to MaxPreps’ rankings, which resulted in Shadow Ridge being swapped out of a final Open spot for Las Vegas High. Then Foothill was placed in the final spot 24 hours later after the NIAA said the school didn’t report a forfeited game.

“What ended up happening is teams at the end of the season, instead of playing to really want to be that No. 4 seed — because it was pretty obvious that it was going to be Gorman, Liberty and Arbor View the top three — no one really wanted to be that 4 seed. That became the issue,” Muraco said. “That’s what principals started asking, ‘Why are we doing this system where (a) sacrificial team’s going to play Gorman and getting beat by 60 or 70 points in the first round the playoffs, and they don’t get a chance to go compete for a state title.

“The way that it flipped from Shadow Ridge to Las Vegas to Foothill on a short week, for them to make those changes on a Monday when you played on a Thursday was just unacceptable.”

CCSD principals came up with a proposal for a change at a November meeting for a 10-team Open Division for the top 10 Southern Nevada teams, which would have limited Gorman to one out-of-state game and a reduced national presence.

After the NIAA Board of Control approved the proposal, the archdiocese legal counsel got involved and threatened a lawsuit against the NIAA, saying it violated its own bylaws on the change to realignment. That led to the 10-team Open Division being rescinded.

“When Gorman sent the letters and their lawyers basically did public information requests on people, that really irritated a lot of people, myself included,” Muraco said. “… When they go to that level then they get the second letter saying, they’re going for damages, and this is how much money they want they’re going to sue for, people were like, ‘Well, if they do rescind this, what’s our options?’ ”

At the January meeting, McNaught hinted at the idea of CCSD programs opting to play as an independent as a result of the recension. According to emails acquired by the Las Vegas Review-Journal in a CCSD public records request, emails show Cimarron-Memorial principal Colin McNaught, a member of the NIAA Board of Control, reaching out to the NIAA about independent status.

“Can you please provide an outline of the process for schools to be identified as independent status for the 2026-27 and 2027-28 school years,” McNaught wrote to NIAA staff.

‘Moving forward’

Principals are scheduled to meet Monday to determine a format for the group of independent teams. Football coaches are then planning to put their schedules together Tuesday.

McNaught referred to any request for comment on CCSD communications. Attempts to reach other principals for comment were unsuccessful.

A statement from the CCSD communications office sent said: “CCSD is aware of the decision by a number of high school principals to move their football programs to independent status. While each school will be responsible for its own schedule, the District will continue to provide the same support to schools that it has in previous years.”

Gorman athletic director Grant Rice did not return a request to comment, and the archdiocese legal counsel and communications offices referred all questions to the Gorman athletic office.

NIAA executive director Tim Jackson said the association met with postseason-eligible 5A and 4A teams Thursday.

“We had a good conversation with them, making sure they had their schedules in place for the regular season, which they do,” Jackson said. “They’re moving forward with their regular-season schedule, and talk with them about what the postseason could look like. …

“In the coming days, we would have a meeting with all 4A and 5A (postseason-eligible teams) statewide to go over what the postseason for 2026 and 2o27 will look like.”

Jackson added that all 30 schools that opted to play as independents are still members in good standing with the NIAA and eligible for postseason competition in other sports.

Change for new formats

This will be the fourth different football format for CCSD public schools since high school football returned from the COVID-19 pandemic. The 2021 and 2022 seasons were the first seasons with the 5A classification and 4A being a Southern-only classification.

Then in 2023 and 2024, 5A was split into three divisions to create seven total state championship games. That led to discussions to reduce the number of state title games, with the result being the HRM system.

Staggs said he’s hopeful that for the next realignment cycle after the 2027 season “all the adults can come together and have the best solution possible for the kids.”

“Speaking to some of the CCSD programs there, they’ve done a really good job with adverse situations,” Staggs said. “I think that’s what football really teaches all the young men that are playing it here in Southern Nevada, when you’re up against it and you’re facing adversity, you got to learn how to persevere, be more resilient. This doesn’t feel like that, and that’s unfortunate for everybody.

“I feel bad for the guys that aren’t able to play in November.”