As some of you may have heard, Los Banos High School is going into a new league. This may seem pretty WAC, but it is not so bad. Rumors have been spreading so Mr. Barcellos clarified the real truth.

Los Banos High School will start in a different league in August 2018. Switching leagues will not change anything in sports. LBHS will remain in WAC still, but they are just playing different schools. The  teams remaining from the current league include Los Banos, Pacheco, and Ceres.  Teams in the new league include Lathrop, Mountain House in Tracy, Fred C. Beyer in Modesto, Grace M. Davis in Modesto, and Peter Johansen in Modesto.

This is not the first time the league has changed. Every four years the section has realignment meetings just in case new schools have entered the section or some schools dropped enrollment.  The league ensures all schools are equal in the amount of people they have. Some leagues do not change at all or, like Los Banos High’s league, will have massive changes. The only change LBHS had our last four years was that El Capitan and Central Catholic dropped the league, making the change unnoticeable.

For those wondering if LB’s competition will be harder or simpler, the athletics director Mr. Barcellos said, “In some sports, it will be a little tougher and in other sports it might not be as difficult. It’s hard to tell because we really don’t play these schools in the preseason. Football wise, I believe we will be able to compete. As for volleyball, they may have a little bit of a tougher time because Beyer has a really good sports program across the board. It will be interesting to see where we fall.”

LBHS will be an eight team league in August 2018. This will make things different because in some sports, LBHS plays teams three times, but now they will only play them two times leaving the school with 16 season games. Mr. Barcellos said the only thing that will change besides the sport teams are the costs. “Costs will become higher for transportation because the school will have to pay for buses to go out to Modesto schools which is pretty far.”

Some student athletes are pretty excited for the new changes in the league like Junior captain of the Varsity basketball team, Amelia Smith because “going into a new league will give us more exposure playing different schools that are in a higher league than us like Modesto schools.”

As for other students like Junior quad athlete Colten Graham, he is worried about the “slight issue of time of travel.”   Going out to Modesto plus coming back home means that students leave their 5th and 6th periods earlier than normal and come back home later than usual.

Overall, the new league has some good changes and bad changes. LBHS will see how their sports will take on the league with new competition and will wait for the big change!