GBL Considers the Future

It’s no secret that the Greater Boston League needs some help. 

Ever since the league lost Peabody and Revere to the Northeastern Conference in 2007, and Waltham and Arlington to the Dual County League a short time later, the five-team league has been seeking relief anywhere it may be found. Relief for the burden of scheduling headaches, long trips to play non-league games and the competitive disadvantages—especially in football—of being forced to play whoever will have them. Usually the likes of St. John’s Prep and Malden Catholic—a bridge too far for all but Everett, typically.

As of yet, they haven’t had any luck.

Over the past few years, the GBL’s member schools have applied for entry into almost every league imaginable, and have been rebuffed each time. The league has applied for entry into the Middlesex League twice, the Northeastern Conference and the Merrimack Valley Conference in the recent past.

Dual Conference Controversy

That brings us to the latest chapter in the GBL’s quest for a solution to the headaches facing the five athletic directors as they try and schedule as many as 12 non-league games per season in some sports. 

When the Dual County League posted a notice on the website of the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association stating that they were accepting applications for new members on March 9, GBL President and Somerville High AD Nicole Viele tossed the league’s hat into the ring.

Also applying for entry were a number of schools from the MVC. 

What happened next has received quite a bit of coverage over the past few weeks: The DCL extended invitations to only three of the schools from the Merrimack Valley Conference and North Andover of the Cape Ann League, and when the three MVC schools withdrew their candidacies, the entire thing was put on hold.

What about the GBL?

That’s where things got a bit sticky.

The powers that be in the DCL refused to consider the league’s application based on the fact that it was not filed by the deadline of May 1.

“We weren’t aware of any timeline,” Viele said during a telephone interview. 

She said there was no deadline posted on the MIAA website, a fact backed up by an article in the Boston Globe on May 12 that reprinted the text of the announcement.

“The process for advertising league expansions needs to be looked at,” Viele said. “The MIAA needs to change that process.”

GBL Appeals to State Association for Help

Despite the minor flap over the deadline, the reality of the situation is that nobody in the GBL ever expected to gain entry into the DCL. The application was filed with the knowledge that they would be refused, and could then approach the MIAA for help, having exhausted every viable option.

“We knew they wouldn’t take us,” said Malden High Athletic Director Dan Keefe. “We wanted to have them refuse us and they did...You name the league, and we’ve applied to it, so at this point in time, the state association (MIAA), they’ve got to do something to help us out...they have to.”

So the GBL remains in the tough spot they’ve occupied for the past few years.

“Scheduling has been very difficult,” said Viele. “We’ve been able to make some connections, but we need to find some competition that’s at our level.”

She was not alone in that mindset.

“The biggest thing is just scheduling relief,” said Keefe. “I mean, take baseball where you’ve got a 20-game schedule. We’re looking at getting 12 non-league games.”

As for the MIAA, there position has long been that they don’t get involved at the local level, but as Keefe points out, there is a trace of hypocrisy in that position when viewed against the MIAA’s intervention on the redistricting front last year.

“(The MIAA) claim that they don’t get  involved at the local level, but they do,” said Keefe. “They overturned the District A/B vote last year on the Arlington issue, and they threw away 15 years of past precedent on that by overturning our district committee vote.”

Last year, Arlington applied for, and was granted entry into the Middlesex League (starting in the fall), but the move appeared to stall out when the District B committee returned a 4-4 vote on the matter, meaning the request was denied. Arlington then appealed to the MIAA Board of Directors, who returned a unanimous decision to green light the switch.

“Arlington was voted down to enter the Middlesex League,” Viele said. “They appealed to the MIAA and won, so the state association did step in in that situation.”

The question being asked in the athletic departments across the GBL, is what about us? 

“They need to help us,” said Keefe. “It’s a nightmare, an absolute nightmare.”

While league officials are in agreement that something needs to be done, just exactly what that something is seems to be a trickier question.

What’s next for the Greater Boston League?

“I’m not sure what the future looks like,” Viele said. “Scheduling has been very difficult.”

Now that the proposed DCL expansion has been shelved for the time being, the likelihood of any kind of MVC-GBL merger has become virtually nil, but Viele indicated that she has had some preliminary discussions with the MVC regarding a scheduling agreement.

Another possibility is the GBL enticing a few schools who are unhappy in their current leagues to join. This makes a lot of sense, provided the league can find suitable schools in close enough proximity to make feasible. Schools that might fancy a switch to the GBL include; Revere ,said to be less than thrilled with the Northeastern Conference and may already be making puppy dog eyes at their former conference; Lynn English, Lynn Classical; and Salem. All of those schools are close enough to make sense from a travel standpoint. Other schools who may not thumb their noses at an invite to the GBL could be Quincy and North Quincy, both of whom were close to joining a few years ago.

Whether or not any schools would be willing to join remains to be seen, but it is something the GBL will be looking at.

“We have tried to do that recently,” said Viele. “I don’t have an ad up yet, but I intend to post one.”

If one were to lay odds on what the future holds for the GBL, adding teams would probably be the favored scenario, but by no means the only one.

“What’s the best case scenario? I don’t know,” said Keefe. “I really don’t know because there’s just so many moving parts to it.

“Obviously, I don’t think we’re in a position to say no to anybody.”

Another option is that the GBL convinces one of the leagues it has already applied to that its candidacy deserves another look. Geographically speaking, the Northeastern Conference is the easiest fit, although the league voted not to absorb the GBL in 2009. The principals vote was 6-6, two votes shy of the eight required to bring the five teams on board.

Two years later, the question would be could the GBL find the two additional votes they need?

Maybe, maybe not.

If no solution is found, the eyes of the league’s members will undoubtedly shift back to the MIAA. But just what the state association should do is a tricky question.

“I don’t know,” said Keefe. “Maybe mandating a league—I don’t know what league—to absorb us...Realistically though, we don’t want the (MIAA) to turn around and say, ‘Alright, go to the Old Colony League.’ It’s got to be practical. From a travel standpoint, it’s got to be practical.”