Berry to rejoin Mecklenburg County conference?

N.C. High School Athletic Association spokesperson Rick Strunk said CMS school officials have submitted paperwork to petition for Berry to rejoin the ME-GA 7 conference next season. Berry is currently in the Rocky River, a conference of 1A and 2A schools, primarily in Union County. Berry's enrollment has grown to where it is now a 3A school.

With CMS's announcement Monday that it would recommend the school board close Harding as a high school, the ME-GA 7 could drop to six teams next season. Adding Berry would bring it back to seven and leave the Rocky River with eight teams.

Strunk said a group of Rocky River principals and athletics directors had voted to allow Berry to leave and a similar group of ME-GA 7 representatives had voted for Berry to join. Strunk said 17 schools were allowed to change conferences in the middle of the last realignment. The current realignment, which began in 2009, runs through the end of the 2012-13 school year.