History
In 2001, local athletic directors met in Mansfield, Ohio to discuss the formation of a new athletic conference; seven schools agreed to form the Ohio Cardinal Conference. Clear Fork, the only non-original member of the conference, joined for the 2004-05 season. Five of the initial member schools came from the disbanding Ohio Heartland Conference: Ashland, Lexington, Mansfield Madison, Mansfield Senior, and Orrville. West Holmes joined from the Mohican-Area Conference, and Wooster from the Federal League.
Bureaucratically, the conference had some early struggles. The first conference commissioner, Jim Glauer, resigned in 2002 before the league even began play. He was replaced by Ron Dessecker from Orrville, who remains the current commissioner.
Lexington High School has dominated the OCC athletically in Tennis since the conference's inception. It has won four consecutive all-sports trophies due to an unweighted scale, the award given to the school with the greatest success in all conference athletic competitions. It also has won the girl's tennis conference title every year in the conference's history, and has won two state title in that sport. Other schools have dominated specific sports in much the same way:Madison girls have dominated the league in volleyball,and boys baseball. Mansfield Senior has been the champion or co-champion in boy's basketball in all five league seasons, Wooster has won five boy's swimming and four girl's swimming titles, and Ashland has four running girl's soccer championships.
West Holmes High School revived discussions that had begun in 2007 with the East Central Ohio League to leave the Ohio Cardinal Conference effective the 2009-10 school year, which would leave the conference with an odd number of teams. West Holmes has since decided, at least for the time being, to remain in the Ohio Cardinal Conference.
An invitation for membership was extended to Triway High School in 2009, but Triway's administration voted to remain in the PAC-8.
Read more about this topic: Ohio Cardinal Conference
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