Legal battles, pure and simple.

As the governing board for New Jersey high school sports works diligently and efficiently to shove its realignment plan down more than 200 schools’ throats, its main concern is avoiding what the state association perceives are the inevitable legal battles with attorneys representing schools on both sides of the never-ending, parochial-public debate.

Why else would the NJSIAA force feed a conference realignment proposal that is being hurried through the hearing and first- and second-reading stagesen route to a final vote on Oct. 1?

Plus, instead of having a plan brought before the general membership of its more than 400 schools, the NJSIAA plan will be voted on by the 48-member executive committee, which appears to be heavily slanted in terms of composition toward almost certain approval when that final vote is taken.

The new conferences would then take effect during the next school year (2009-10).

Originally, realignment of most conferences back in 1982 and the tweaking of some more in 1986, was intended to satisfy inequities in scheduling for certain, so-called urban schools versus the perceived advantages of many suburban schools.

It took time then, and it should take more time now to think through the entire idea of realignment. As it is, schools received the recent proposal from the NJSIAA on or around Aug. 22. That gave superintendents, principals, athletic directors and board of education members a little more than a week to evaluate the plan and file an appeal.

Not only was the short timeline unreasonable, but it occurred during the late August vacation period.

All appeals from schools had to be filed by Sept. 2, the hearing was yesterday and the final vote is slated for a few weeks from today. It would certainly appear that the entire procedure is designed to make sure the proposal is approved before many folks have the chance to review all the factors involved.

The league realignment issue is not new, nor has it been easy to solve. In the mid-1970s, both Barringer and Passaic were two of the city schools at the forefront in campaigning with the NJSIAA for major reforms in terms of conferences and scheduling.

Many of those new leagues and conferences, from the Northern Hills, which contains schools from three different counties, and the Mountain Valley, which was originally comprised of schools from Union, Middlesex and Somerset counties, have been im perfect from a geographical standpoint.

But, others, such as the Iron Hills and Colonial Hills, have a fairly concise and reasonable framework. And there are many member schools that are happy with the current setup.

Then there is the Northern New Jersey Interscholastic League, the centerpiece of all the intense drama pertaining to the realignment issue. It’s also the starting point of the fears of legal wrangling down the line, unless something is done sooner than later, stemming from the acrimony among public schools such as Nutley, Belleville and Ridgewood versus the parochial titans, especially Don Bosco Prep.

There were 12 public schools that threatened to secede from the NNJIL last January unless something was done to alleviate the competitive disadvantage of having to send their respective male and female teams up against Don Bosco Prep, Bergen Catholic, St. Joseph of Montvale and Immaculate Heart (girls only) regularly.

The sport that is at the crux of the controversy is football, and the school at the center of the discussion is always nationally ranked Don Bosco Prep.

However, St. Joe’s and to a lesser extent, B.C., are still part of the powerhouse parochial problem as well, which has fueled continued sentiment toward separating parochials from publics, at least in football. The sport has less games and less chance to schedule national opponents due to the NJSIAA’s requirement that 70 percent of a team’s games be in-state games in order to qualify for its State tournaments.

Even with the new one-year transfer rule at the high school level taking effect for the first time this month, don’t expect that the rich will not get richer anyway, as they now look to reach down to the middle school level like never before, allowing them to skirt around the transfer rule.

The one-year transfer rule emerged and athletes such as The Montclair Kimberley Academy’s Kyrie Irving in basketball (now at St. Patrick’s) made sure they made their moves when the 30-day transfers rule was still was in effect before Sept. 1, 2008.

The NJSIAA’s proposed elimination of 11 sports conferences and the advent of Super Conferences in our neck of the woods may have nothing to do directly with the transfer rule, but realignment will remain an equally hot topic when it comes to inequities in the system.

One of the new Super Conferences will serve some larger Essex County schools quite well, but the conference realignment proposal leaves small non-publics, both private and parochial, in less than desirable circumstances.

Look at Montclair for instance, and the three co-ed high schools and their unique situations in regards to realignment.

For Montclair High, the proposed Super Conference 1, Division A is a terrific loop, with fellow members East Orange Campus, West Orange, Seton Hall Prep, Columbia, Barringer, Bloomfield, Livingston and Mount St. Dominic (girls only) comprising a geographic-sensible and competitively balanced slate for many sports.

"I’m excited because for us, the plan does so much from an Essex County standpoint," said Porcelli, MHS vice principal for athletics and activities.

"And, we only have to face one parochial [SHP for the boys and the Mount for the girls], and the fact it’s Seton Hall Prep and not Don Bosco or St. Joe’s is much better for us, especially in football."

The Mounties have had to face Don Bosco Prep in football for the last eight seasons, including once again this year.

To be rid of the Ironmen and replace them with a more reasonable parochial - in terms of football power at least - in SHP, is reasonable and encouraging competition-wise in the proposed Group 4 Essex division.

But, there are also many private schools that don’t stress football as an end-all, be-all.

Two of those schools are MKA and Immaculate Conception, both of which, despite their varying economic levels in terms of tuition costs involved, stress academics and discipline first over winning on the playing fields.

And, coincidentally, both MKA and IC are in the process of rebuilding their football programs (they were a combined 3-17 last autumn). The proposed realignment plan will do little to promote that sport’s progress.

"Football is certainly the straw that stirs the drink, but we have 23 other sports that we’re concerned about," said Todd Smith, MKA’s athletic director.

"The NJSIAA’s proposed realignment didn’t take into account private schools across the board. We were a mere afterthought."

"From our standpoint, we don’t feel we were truly represented on the [34-member Leagues and Conference] Realignment Committee," said IC’s Athletic Director Sean Morris, a former standout player at IC and now the Montclair parochial school’s football coach. "They’ve put us in a conference where we’re going up against other schools with populations a lot larger than ours [190 in the upper three grades in addition to 80-plus freshmen this fall].

"Lyndhurst, which I believe has 482 students in grades 10 through 12, is an example of a school that is much bigger than us in our division. From a football standpoint only, we’re certainly not looking forward to playing a powerhouse, Group 1 program like Hasbrouck Heights.

"Another component of the plan which I don’t like at all is that the NJSIAA is telling us that when we need to look for other games outside our division, we have to stay within our Super Conference. This means trying to schedule games in sports such as girls basketball against teams in a Group 3 division that includes schools such as Shabazz and Irvington when we’d be much better served scheduling other small parochials like Mary Help of Christians and Lacordaire, which is a natural rival for us in Montclair."

For the record, the proposed Super Conference 1, Division C, includes the following 16 teams, five of which don’t have football teams: MKA, IC, Lyndhurst, Science Park, Arts, Verona, North Arlington, Becton, Glen Ridge, Technology, University, Hasbrouck Heights, Bloomfield Tech, Wood-Ridge, Cedar Grove and Wallington.

"In one swoop, they’ve ended prep rivalries such as us with Newark Academy, Pingry and Morristown-Beard that have existed for a century or more," said Smith.

"In our minds, we should be able to play those schools if we choose to. But, now, they are all in different Super Conferences from where we’re told we cannot schedule games.

"I think the state should really think this over some more before casting its final vote on the matter."