The Mississippi High School Activities Association announced a restructuring of its classifications for sports in the state Tuesday.
Athletic programs were placed in seven classes based on enrollments numbers within each school.
In terms of Pike County schools, North Pike and McComb remained in classifications 5A and 4A respectively. The Jaguars are the 18th-largest school in 5A out of 24, while the Tigers are the second-largest in 4A out of 40 possible programs.
The most notable local change comes for South Pike. After residing in the 3A level for years, the Eagles are moving up to the 4A level, where they will be the smallest school in the classification. South Pike was just one student above the 3A level, and this notably places the school in the same class as arch rivals McComb.
Elsewhere, Bogue Chitto dropped to the 1A level and Amite County remains in 2A as the largest school in that class. Tylertown remained in 3A and is the 24th-largest school out of 40 in that class, while Franklin County is the 10th-largest.
The respective regions for each classification are still being worked on and will be announced at a later date.
