The wrestling world was flipped upside down last week when news broke of new divisional alignment in the East Penn Conference. The league replaced their three division format, with two divisions consisting of nine teams each.

Whitehall athletic director and co-chair of wrestling in the EPC, Bob Hartman, spoke at length about the changes for next season and how the process unfolded."It wasn't that coaches weren't happy with the old system," Hartman said. "It was more of how can we make this better. Ideas are always presented at our coaches meetings and this was one of them. All the coaches were in agreement when we talked about it. There were no dissenting opinions about this proposal when it came up."That's why it's really frustrating to read things in the paper about coaches displeasure."This past season saw the EPC operate with three divisions of six teams, which consisted of eight league bouts.That has been scrapped with the hope, to quote Hartman, "make things better," by incorporating two divisions of nine teams, where each team will wrestle all eight of their divisional counterparts during the season, alongside a ninth dual meet on "Championship Day," which will be held on Jan. 30, 2016, a week before district duals.The first-place team in Division A will wrestle the first-place team in Division B with the same premise following all the way down the pecking order to both ninth-place finishers squaring off against each other.How the divisions came together is a question and answer that may sound simpler than it is since you're dealing with formulas,"We used a power point system, similar to what we did a year ago," said Hartman, "along with a formula that was created by [Stroudsburg coach] Matt Kleinle that factored in a team's returning wrestlers."With that said, the two divisions are highlighted below. The numbers next to each school represent where the teams fell in the power ranking formula for next season.Division A is Bethlehem Catholic (1); Freedom (4); Parkland (5); Emmaus (8); Northampton (9); Dieruff (12); Whitehall (13); Pocono Mountain West (16) and East Stroudsburg North (17).Division B consists of Easton (2); Stroudsburg (3); Nazareth (6); Pleasant Valley (7); East Stroudsburg South (10); Liberty (11); Allen (14); Pocono Mountain East (15) and Central Catholic (18).With each school getting 22 competition points to use throughout the season, nine are already eaten up by the regular season schedule, leaving 13 points for teams to play with, compared to teams having 14 points remaining last season after only having eight dual meets. Hartman wants flexibility for all teams and understands the importance that it gives wrestling programs. With most tournaments counting as three points each, teams can factor in four tournaments at the most and still schedule another dual meet before reaching their threshold of 22 points.The problem with the set up is that it leaves some favorable matchups out of the regular season initially, as there are no cross over bouts.For example, with Liberty and Freedom being on opposite sides of the divisions, they would have to schedule the match independently, as it would be criminal to not have both city rivals square off during the season.Therein lies the debate of not having classic matchups between local rivals slated on the official league calendar and forcing teams to use their remaining competition points at the expense of tournaments.Whether it's an individual tournament or dual meet tournament, coaches value those opportunities immensely in wrestling."Tournaments allow you to see different styles and get out of the area," said Freedom head coach Brandon Hall. "If we go in a dual meet tournament, it gives us the opportunity to pick up some wins and our wrestlers get to compete in five matches."I think tournaments help breed confidence and creates a strong team bond. It's a different experience when you get on the road and that's important.""Championship Day" is the ultimate wild card in this equation, as nobody knows where teams will end up heading into that intriguing January weekend. It could provide for great matches, which by the way, will count towards district duals and help individual wrestlers when it comes to district seeding.Or it could cause more controversy and get the wrestling world riled up all over again.That may not be a bad thing, as it is mid-April and we're talking about wrestling in the East Penn Conference.