Back to the future: Lions football returns to Class 4A

COTTAGE GROVE – The Cottage Grove football team is on the move – again.

One year after moving from Class 4A down to 3A – and finishing the regular season undefeated – the Oregon Schools Activities Association (OSAA) voted on Monday, Feb. 3, to move the Lions back to Class 4A for next season. 

Cottage Grove football coach Steve Turner, who had previously said he hoped his team would remain in Class 3A for at least another year, said he sees the OSAA decision as a positive challenge rather than a negative. 

“In life, we don’t necessarily have control over outcomes,” he said. “This is one of those things that we don’t have control over. You can make it a negative, but you can also make it a positive. And that’s the idea going forward. We have to look at it as a positive deal.

“Life’s full of challenges, so we’re going to look at this as a challenge. Not that 3A wasn’t, but it’s getting us back to where we have been in the past. Now the challenge is for coaches as well as players and administration to continue to work to get kids to come out and play. As well as make the game fun for them,” Turner said.

The OSAA’s Executive Board on Monday reviewed and voted upon a football ad hoc advisory committee’s final recommendation for classification changes. One of the recommendations included Cottage Grove moving back to Class 4A.

Following the vote, Kris Welch, OSAA assistant executive director, confirmed with The Chronicle the vote was approved and changes recommended for schools from 1A to 6A are finalized. 

Cottage Grove rejoins its previous 4A league in Special District 3. However, Special District 3 looks a little different from what the Lions might remember. The Cascade Cougars and the Stayton Eagles have moved to Special District 2.

For the 2025 season, Special District 3 will include the Crescent Valley Raiders, the Junction City Tigers, the Marist Catholic Spartans, the Philomath Warriors, and the Sweet Home Huskies. The Raiders drop down from 5A. The Tigers and Warriors have both remained in 4A since moving up from 3A in 2022. The Huskies have remained a 4A team for the past 10 years.

The Lions’ departure leaves ripples throughout 3A, which has left athletic directors such as Creswell’s Brandon Standridge and Pleasant Hill’s Kyle McClain scrambling to fill Cottage Grove’s league vacancy. 

Another team on the move is the Harrisburg Eagles – going down to Class 2A after competing as a 3A team for the past 10 years.

“Anytime you shrink the league, it’s not good for us,” Standridge said. “It’s always tough to shrink a league. (It) makes it a little more difficult to find some non-league games. However, I understand that Harrisburg needed to go down, and the reason they moved Cottage Grove back up.”

McClain echoed Standridge’s comments.

“It’s going to be a smaller league, and on the logistics side of things, it makes scheduling pretty hard, especially scheduling the non-league games,” McClain said.

The Lions’ 9-0 record in their first year playing in Class 3A caught the ad hoc committee’s attention, even though Cottage Grove lost in the first round of the playoffs. School officials and fans have understandably had apprehension about a potential return to 4A. After all, the Lions had only two wins in the past five years at 4A. 

Turner’s focus is on meeting the challenge at 4A, which includes seeing the potential rewards of competing at the higher level, such as increased recognition for all-conference and all-state players. It’s also an opportunity, he said, to validate the program’s improvement and continue its positive direction.

“It gives some validity to what we did last year,” Turner said. “People saw that we improved, and we are getting better, and the program is changing, and that’s a good sign. I think people look at the higher classification you play in as a more difficult one, which it is. There are going to be rewards for stepping up in the division.”

Cottage Grove athletic director, Garrett Bridgens, also sees the opportunity to build on the Lions’ successes last year in 3A.

“Returning to 4A is a significant step for our program,” Bridgens said. “It reflects the resilience and commitment of our players and coaches, as well as the unwavering support of our school and community. Cottage Grove belongs at the 4A level, where we have a proud history of competing and succeeding, and we’re ready to embrace this challenge and continue building on our success.”

Garrett Bridgens

Bridgens and Turner said they’ve already taken steps to prepare for the move. “The preseason schedule has been carefully crafted to provide valuable preparation for the challenges ahead,” Bridgens said. This includes keeping local rivalries alive with Creswell and Pleasant Hill, “as well as matchups against North Marion and Coquille – two familiar opponents from last year’s preseason.” 

“The good thing is our first four games are against opponents that we played last year, so it’s not like we’re jumping right into it, you know?” Turner said. “Creative scheduling will help us tremendously.”

With the loss of Cottage Grove and Harrisburg from Class 3A’s Special District 3, Standridge said he doesn’t see much changing this upcoming season. He cited the fact Creswell often plays 4A teams each season.

“We play 4A teams like Marist Catholic in a lot of sports. (Those matchups) are pretty competitive,” Standridge said. “But it also depends; there’s no way we could compete with them for football.

“For Cottage Grove football, they’ve played a lot of teams in our league and been competitive. So playing them at 4A next year, it’s just a good chance for us to stay close and remain competitive. Even though they’re 4A they’re not that much different from us right now. I don’t think we would’ve wanted to play them in their state championship years a few years back, but where we are and where they are right now is a good competitive game for both of us.”

Brandon Standridge

Pleasant Hill’s McClain said he thinks the changes position Pleasant Hill well for playoff contention. Also, he mentions Pleasant Hill’s history since 2016 and the potential for Pleasant Hill to fill a vacant spot in the league, especially with a new head coach.

“I’m excited. It puts us in a pretty good position to make the playoffs,” McClain said. “Obviously, Cottage Grove is an up-and-coming program, and we’ve played them for the last three years, and we lost last year and beat them the previous two years, and so we’ve kind of gone back and forth with them. But I also would have been excited if it went the other way. We haven’t reached the playoffs since 2016. It’s going to be good to have the excitement from (new head coach) Kenny (Koberstein) on staff, and in a new league where there’s no real clear favorite now, I think it’s up for grabs.

Kyle McClain

“Sisters is going to be tough, of course. But outside of that, Pleasant Hill is in a position, especially with our new head coach, to kind of fill in that vacant spot.”