Iowa High School Looking To Consolidate In More Sports After Canceling Football Season

One Iowa high school athletic department is facing extremely low numbers in multiple sports, prompting school officials to begin searching for programs to share with.

Exira-EHK High School has already cancelled the upcoming 2026 Iowa High School Athletic Association varsity football season, going instead with a junior varsity-only series of games. According to a report by Western Iowa Today, they have also shared softball with Audubon.

The Exira-EHK/Audubon softball team is currently ranked No. 1 in Class 1A of the Iowa Girls High School Athletic Union. A total of 11 of the players on the 23-girl team are from Exira-EHK. They are 15th in the latest High School On SI Iowa Top 25 State Rankings as they prepare for postseason play.

Enrollment For Exira-EHK School District Continues To Drop

Enrollment at the high school level for the Spartans is down by over 20 students, with the expectation for even more of a drop in overall enrollment moving into the 2026-2027 school year.

Tom Petersen, the Exira-EHK athletic director, was part of a community-wide meeting earlier this week alongside Trevor Miller, the school superintendent.

“I’m going to continue to campaign, keep working (to get more kids out),” Petersen said. “It’s just part of being an AD and a coach. I have tried every scenario that I can to try and make it that our kids could go and play varsity (football).

“It’s not the state’s fault, it’s not our fault; it’s the middle of a two-year cycle. I coached here for 20 years in football and it’s crushing (to not have a program).”

Petersen also mentioned during the meeting that he is struggling to fill several coaching vacancies, including the head boys basketball position. He said that they have received zero applications for that coaching vacancy.

Spartans Currently Share Multiple Sports With Audubon

Along with baseball and softball, the Exira-EHK school district also shares girls basketball, boys wrestling, girls wrestling, boys tennis and girls tennis with Audubon. Petersen is proposing to the school board a share agreement for boys basketball, boys track and field, and girls track and field, in addition to the other sports.

Last fall, the Spartans went 4-5 overall, as they won 22 games over a stretch of seasons after going 0-7 in 2020. Exira-EHK was 12-1 in 2013 and had three consecutive years of at least eight wins after that.

The schools are a combination of the towns of Exira, Elk Horn and Kimballton.