MADISON- The Alabama High School Athletic Association approved the latest seven-classification system for championship play for the 2024-25 and 2025-26 school years. For Madison Academy, the new classifications, which are rebooted every two years, will mean some changes in both football and volleyball play for the Mustangs’ athletic program.

The Madison Academy football program will move up to Class 4A while the volleyball team will move down to Class 4A beginning next season with the alignments for the remainder of the winter and spring sports determined following the completion of those championship seasons.

“We are excited to move back to Class 4A. We have a lot of great competition right here in the Huntsville area that should make for some exciting Friday nights,” said Bob Godsey head coach of Madison Academy football.

In Class 4A, Madison Academy will play in Region 8, which includes three additional private schools similar to Madison Academy. Those schools include Randolph, Westminster and St. John Paull II along with D.A.R. of Grant, Madison County of Gurley, New Hope and two perennial programs of North Jackson (located in Stevenson) and Rainsville’s Plainview High.

The last two seasons of football, the Mustangs have played in Class 3A where they posted a 23-4 record losing in the state playoffs each year, including the just completed 2023 season where the loss came in the state championship game against Mobile Christian. The last outing in Class 4A for the Mustangs came in the seasons of 2021 and 2020. In those two Class 4A seasons they posted a 22-3 record.

The volleyball squad will move down to Class 4A from Class 5A where they played the past two seasons. Both the cross country and swim programs will remain in their respective classifications (3A).

The 2024-2025 and 2025-2026 football alignment places the 32 largest schools in Class 7A. Those schools include Bob Jones, James Clemens and Sparkman. Fifty-seven schools will be listed in 6A, 56 in Class 5A, 62 in Class 4A, 60 in Class 3A, 60 in Class 2A and 62 in Class 1A. AHSAA Executive Director Alvin Briggs said of the latest classifications, “More than 190,000 student-athletes are expected to participate in AHSAA sports activities during the upcoming classification period.”

Classification is based on Average Daily Membership (ADM) figures furnished by the State Department of Education in grades 9-11.