Come the school year 2014-15, the Okaw Valley Conference will have three new members.

Three remaining members of a dismembered Okaw Valley Conference have found three new schools to join them in preserving the Okaw Valley Conference name. Rantoul, Champaign St. Thomas More, and St. Joseph Ogden have agreed to join the Okaw Valley. Assistant Principal and Athletic Director at Monticello High School, Randy Moss says this could not have ended any better for Monticello, Tolono Unity, and Maroa-Forsyth.

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The deadline to get three schools committed was November 1. Moss says there was a point where he was worried things would not work out. He says that point came when they received an invitation from the Sangamon Valley Conference to join, so they applied, then were rejected. But that may have played in the favor of these three schools gaining three new members.

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A meeting Monday decided the Okaw Valley name would be preserved, a conference President was named. Brian Brooks, Principal of St. Joseph Ogden High School was named the Conference President. Once those things were established the next priority for the group was expansion beyond 2014-15. While Moss could not name who was invited, four schools were invited to join them.

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Moss says this new conference is going to be fantastic and very competitive. He says they were very pleased with the way things ended up for all the parties involved. He felt as though their patience was rewarded at the end because it was the best outcome they could have received.