By BUTCH HARMON
After competing in the Capital Area Athletics Conference (CAAC) since 2007, the Corunna Cavaliers will have a new athletic home next year, as they voted September 16 to move to the Genesee Athletic Conference (GAC).
“Our board voted 7-0 to withdraw from the CAAC and move to the GAC,” said athletic director Nicole Norris. “We will withdraw from the CAAC and begin play in the GAC in the 2014 season. I’m in the process of doing the paperwork right now.”
A number of factors went into the decision to switch to the GAC, which is more of a Flint-area league than the CAAC, which is more of a greater Lansing area league.
“We looked at a lot of things,” Norris said. “One of the main factors was the travel and transportation cost and how that affects our athletes athletically and academically. We wanted to reduce the amount of travel for our teams. Not only the cost of the travel but having our student-athletes getting back home later. Not only will switching to the GAC reduce the travel, but it will allow our students to get home earlier, and it will give their parents and our fans more of an opportunity to see them play.”
By joining the GAC, the Cavaliers will re-establish their league rivalry with Durand. The Cavaliers will be in the Red division of the GAC, where they will also be competing against Beecher, Montrose, Mt. Morris, Goodrich, and Lake Fenton.
“There were a lot of positives to both conferences, but the GAC is more local,” Norris said. “It will also give us the opportunity to be competitive on the field. The GAC is an established league and it will give us outstanding competition. It has a lot to offer our student-athletes.”
The GAC is just the third league the Cavaliers have been a part of in the past 50 years. From 1962 through 2007, Corunna was a member of the Mid Michigan B League that included at one time or another Durand, Ovid-Elsie, Perry, Portland, Alma, Chesaning, St. Johns and Ionia.
“We enjoyed our association with the CAAC,” Norris said. “We just see the move to the GAC as more beneficial for our to our student-athletes, their parents, and our fans.”