High Point Christian Academy struggled at times last football season.

Scheduling games, that is.

No, the wins and losses worked out just fine as the Cougars’ second-year program finished 5-2. But three games got cancelled due to issues with the opposing teams’ lower-level programs.

Problem solved.

HPCA is ready to go varsity and got a big dose of stability injected into its program with acceptance into the Carolina Piedmont Football Conference. Remarkably, the 2010 schedule already is set and includes league foes Christ School of Asheville, First Assembly Christian School of Concord, Forsyth Country Day, Hickory Grove Baptist and Northside Christian of Charlotte, SouthLake Christian of Huntersville and Westminster Catawba Christian of Rock Hill, S.C.

“We’re very excited,” Cougars coach Steve Lechner said. “We feel like it’s a good fit and now we have a real clear football goal going forward: to compete and become a team that is capable of winning a conference title and going deep into the playoffs.”

Those goals would have seemed laughable even five years ago, as HPCA only began to field varsity teams in its athletic department in the 2005-06 school year. The addition of a football program saw a young JV team go 3-5 in 2008, but enough players came out that the Cougars played a JV and middle school schedule this past fall.

Everything has progressed exactly on schedule.

“It’s what we’ve been planning on the last three or four years,” Cougars athletic director Corey Gesell said. “Our families are very excited and they recognize the improvement in our program the past two years. Our kids are gaining skill and the coaching staff is doing a great job in developing our players.

Lechner enthusiastically began the task of building a program from the ground up because he could sense the excitement at HPCA.

“Taking the job, I felt very confident that all the pieces were in place to move at the desired pace,” Lechner explained. “The infrastructure was strong in terms of school and parental support. Coming into a situation like this, the only question mark after that is the players: You need to get the players to buy in, have a good number of players, and we managed to do that. Our kids have been real serious and committed throughout.”

Despite the obvious growing pains, HPCA’s first team of seventh- through ninth-graders ended the season with 39 players. This past fall saw 30 kids – including several newcomers from area schools – on the JV team for freshmen and sophomores, with another 35 players on the middle school squad.

When it became obvious that varsity football was the next step, Gesell began to look into a football home for the Cougars. Essentially, the options boiled down to joining schools in the Raleigh/Fayetteville region, the Charlotte area – or the CPFC.

School officials petitioned for entry into the league, laid out what HPCA is all about and the school’s plans for the future at a meeting of the conference’s athletics directors, and got the green light.

“We’re looking to bring some great football to the Triad area from a Christian school/private school perspective,” Gesell said. “And we would love to play some of the local public schools in the coming years. Our kids are in the community and they know each other. We’d like to develop those relationships in football and other sports.”

HPCA makes its varsity football debut Aug. 20 at Bishop McGuinness. The JV team will consist of seventh- through ninth-graders and varsity will run 10 through 12 – standard for the CPFC teams.

The 2010-11 school year will be one of great transition for High Point Christian, whose high school enrollment of 240 students led to another move: The school just gained entry into the PACIS – the Piedmont Athletic Conference of Independent Schools – with Wesleyan Christian Academy, Forsyth Country Day and Greensboro Day. Starting next August, the Cougars will be a 3A squad in the NCISAA, leaving behind the 2A Triad Athletic Conference.

Heady stuff, indeed, for a school playing middle school and JV schedules a short five years ago.

shanf@hpe.com | 888-3526