Big Eight Conference (Wisconsin)

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Big Eight Conference Member School Locations in Wisconsin

The Big Eight Conference is a high school athletic conference with its membership concentrated in south central Wisconsin. All member schools are affiliated with the Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association.

The Big Eight Conference was originally formed in 1925 as the Big Six Conference and its original members were Beloit Memorial, Janesville, Kenosha, Madison Central, Madison East and Racine.^[1] It consisted of the largest high schools in southern Wisconsin that were located outside of the greater Milwaukee area and was alternatively known by its official name (the Southern Wisconsin Conference) during its early years.^[2] The conference added a seventh high school in 1929, a year after Racine High School split into William Horlick High School on the north side and Washington Park High School on the south side of the city.^[3] Park took Racine's place in the conference when it was split in 1928, and Horlick joined the conference a year later.^[4] However, it wouldn't be known as the "Big Seven" for long as Madison added a third high school on the west side of the city in 1930,^[5] and they immediately became members upon opening.^[6] The original Big Eight lineup lasted over thirty years before growth created a rift that changed its membership in the modern era.

As the metropolitan areas of the Big Eight grew, so too did the need for more space for high school students to relieve overcrowding. Madison opened a fourth high school on the city's far east side in 1963 named after Wisconsin politician Robert M. LaFollette.^[7] They joined the Big Eight in 1964 along with the new George Nelson Tremper High School on the south side of Kenosha.^[8] The existing high school in Kenosha was also renamed after local educator Mary D. Bradford. More changes were on the horizon, and three more recently opened high schools joined the conference. Jerome I. Case High School opened on Racine's west side in 1966, and two others joined in 1967: James Madison Memorial High School^[9] (renamed after Wisconsin politician Vel Phillips in 2021^[10]) on Madison's far west side and George S. Parker High School on Janesville's west side.^[11] Janesville's current high school was also named after local politician Joseph A. Craig in the process.^[12]

By this time, the Big Eight had ballooned to thirteen members (twelve after Madison Central High School closed in 1969), and along with that growth came greater problems with scheduling and travel. In 1967, the five Madison high schools announced their exit from the Big Eight Conference and gave the three high schools in Rock County the option of joining them in a new conference, which they accepted.^[13] The five high schools in Racine and Kenosha formed the South Shore Conference after their forced removal from the Big Eight,^[14] which had a tumultuous ten-year history before it was finally disbanded in 1980.^[15]

With the Madison-area schools having successfully split from those in southeastern Wisconsin, the new-look Big Eight Conference began play in 1970 with seven schools (Beloit Memorial, Janesville Craig, Janesville Parker, Madison East, Madison La Follette, Madison Memorial and Madison West).^[16] Membership increased back to eight with the addition of Sun Prairie High School from the Badger Conference in 1977,^[17] and in later years the Big Eight added two other large metropolitan Madison high schools: Middleton in 1994^[18] and Verona in 2008^[19] (both formerly of the Badger Conference). Membership stayed at ten schools until 2022, when Sun Prairie High School completed its split into two schools.^[20] Sun Prairie High School became Sun Prairie East and Sun Prairie West High School was completed on the west side of the district. The following year, Beloit Memorial left the Big Eight after nearly a century of membership to join the Southern Lakes Conference.

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