Unbeknowst to many, this past year, 4A has been split into two divisions for football, basketball, baseball, softball and volleyball. The effect of this decision will be seen during this year’s postseason of basketball.

These two divisions will be Division I, which will be the 32 largest schools, and Division II, the 32 smallest schools. De Soto will be in Division I. The change is in effect this year, except for football which will be affected in the fall of 2014.

This occurred because of the difference in size between the largest school and the smallest school in Class 4A. The largest school, Highland Park High School, had an enrollment of 729 in 2012-13.

The smallest schools, Frotenac High School and Rock Creek High School, both had 259 students enrolled last year. This meant that Highland Park was 283 percent larger than the Frotenac and Rock Creek.

All leagues in Kansas supported the measure except for the Frontier League, which De Soto High School is a member of.

Boys’ head basketball coach Matt Rice, however, thought the change was “best for the smaller schools.”

“I am probably for it,” Rice said. “I think the more equitable you make opportunities for schools to play for championships, the better.”

This change affected Sub-State basketball this year as the division was split during postseason. De Soto High School hosted Sub-State and because of the split, only four teams competed at De Soto instead of eight teams.

Rice thought that this change positively affected the team since it made Sub-State smaller and gave the team a larger chance of getting to the State tournament for the next couple of years, until DHS moves to 5A.

“In the past, we had to win three games to get out of Sub-State and into the State tournament, now we had to only win two,” Rice said.

However, this did not drastically change the competition that the basketball team would see.

“We are still playing the same teams because most of the schools around here are in the division we are in, but there are fewer of them than there used to be,” Rice said.