It was a happy bunch of East Limestone Indians back in early September when they opened the football season against Athens. The two schools will continue to play each other, but in the same region beginning next fall. East has been reclassified as a Class 5A school, the same as Athens. See how all Limestone County schools stack up in the new classifications in the Sports section.

East Limestone High School will feel like a “small dog in a big pond,” said Principal Dennis Black after learning the school will move from a 4A school to a 5A school next fall.

The Alabama High School Athletic Association recently reclassified schools statewide for the 2008-09 and 2009-10 school years. Although most schools’ classifications did not change, those that did will compete in a new class for football as well as all other sports.

East will soon be competing in the region against Athens, Russellville, Hartselle, Muscle Shoals, Johnson, Butler and Lee of Huntsville.

“It’s going to require the whole school and community pulling together,” Black said. “We’ve got to go to work and do the very best we can. But I think our kids will respond and the community will respond and we will do fine no matter what level we are competing in. Football Coach (Jeff) Pugh and his staff will do a great job.”

Clements High School moved down in classification from Class 3A to 2A.

In that region, Clements will be competing against Tanner, Cherokee, Hatton, Lexington, Phil Campbell, Red Bay and Westminster Christian.

AHSAA Executive Director Steve Savarese said schools are reclassified every two years to take into consideration the changing enrollments of schools, school consolidations and closings, new schools and association members and current member schools adding sports to their interscholastic program.

Schools are divided into six classifications (1A-6A for competition in championship programs.

Classification was based on the average daily membership figures furnished by the State Department of Education for the upper three grades (10-12) plus ninth-grade holdbacks. Schools with the largest enrollments are placed in Class 6A, the next largest in Class 5A and so on.

Black said East Limestone would have games 1, 5 and 10 open for outside region play in football. He said those games will be determined in the next two weeks.

In Class 5A, Athens is the sixth-largest school in the state with 638 students. East Limestone is 62nd out of 64 schools with 423. Thirteen additional students moved East from Class 4A to Class 5A.

In Class 4A, Ardmore is the 36th largest school with 340 students.

In Class 3A, Lauderdale County High is the ninth-largest school with 285 students, West Limestone is 16th with 278 students and Elkmont is 34th with 258 students.

In Class 2A, Clements is the 12th-largest school in the state with 209 students, while Tanner is the 49th largest with 176 students.

In Class 1A, Athens Bible School is the 27th largest with 120 students.

Bob Jones High School in Madison is the largest school in Alabama in all classifications with 2,055 students. Sparkman High is the fourth-largest school in the state.