Spruce Mountain High School’s decision to leave the Mountain Valley Conference and join the Kennebec Valley Athletic Conference, approved by its school committee this past Thursday, could be the wave of the future.

It mirrors the choices being made at the major-college level, where universities often follow their overall financial interests or the relative strength of a particular sport and do what they deem best.

We haven’t seen rampant moves in the tri-county region, but the Phoenix’s election to take flight isn’t without precedent.

A decade ago, Edward Little and Lewiston forsook their long-term relationship with the Southern Maine Activities Association and joined the KVAC’s Class A division.

The move appeared to be a wash, both competitively and in terms of travel expense, when it happened. Some decried the loss of long-standing rivalries with Greater Portland schools, but new ones with Bangor, Brunswick, Lawrence and Oxford Hills filled that void nicely. And with the socioeconomic patterns only making the border between the infamous “two Maines” more cavernous, hindsight tells us the move likely has allowed the Red Eddies and Blue Devils to stay relatively competitive in all sports.

It also is worth noting, coincidence or not, that the two most recent schools to make such a switch have a common denominator. Lee Hixon was athletic director at Saint Dominic Academy when it transferred from the Western Maine Conference to the MVC. Hixon is now AD at Spruce.

That’s where the comparisons end. Leaving the Class B-dominated WMC gave St. Dom’s, a school with a enrollment that has long teetered between Classes C and D, a more palatable schedule in most sports.

Spruce Mountain, in the third year post-consolidation of the longtime rival Jay and Livermore Falls programs, is on the opposite end of the spectrum. In the two-heads-are-better-than-one department, it immediately took what had been strong, separate programs in basketball and field hockey and turned them into an MVC powerhouse.

Those teams have made the habit of breezing through their regular seasons — often undefeated, occasionally unchallenged — only to encounter a humbling situation against a Southern Maine opponent in the playoffs. Those teams, in theory and probably in reality, play a tougher regular-season schedule.

That is far from the only factor that gives a team from Cumberland, Yarmouth or York an advantage over a team from Chisholm at tourney time, but for a moment, let’s pretend that it is. Loading up the league schedule against Class B schools instead of Class C foes surely better prepares the hoop and field hockey teams for what they will encounter down the road. In that respect, abandoning the safety and tradition of the MVC makes competitive sense.

And while it will weird to see Dirigo, Mountain Valley, Lisbon and Winthrop off the schedule, new rivals Leavitt and Maranacook are next door. Gardiner, Waterville and Winslow are relatively short trips for the Spruce Mountain faithful. And although Camden Hills, Medomak Valley and Nokomis aren’t exactly local, hey, at least there won’t be any more snowy rides home from Boothbay or Wiscasset. I bet if you do the math all the way across the board, belonging to the KVAC might be a small fuel savings.

Of course, the change will benefit some sports more than others. The MVC was a pretty good fit for Spruce Mountain in soccer and baseball. It’ll be a bumpy road to the playoffs in the KVAC. But we’ve seen that in the world at large, haven’t we? Moving from the Big East to the ACC did more favors for Boston College in football than basketball, it’s safe to say.

Then there’s the question of what will happen if Spruce Mountain’s enrollment drops back to a Class C level in 5 or 10 years — something that’s likely in this age of smaller families and a tighter job market. But we can only grade the move in the here-and-now, and on those terms, I applaud the Phoenix and their leadership for making this bold decision.

I also hope that it fuels further discussion that the conferences and classes, the scheduling matrices they employ and the Heal Points that have been used to set tournament seedings from time immemorial perhaps all are outdated.

Maine has changed more quickly than its high school sports have evolved in response. Maine Principals Association executive director Dick Durost admitted as much at a pair of recent brainstorming sessions, signaling possible major changes before the decade is up.

Everything is on the table, including suggestions of a fifth or even sixth class in basketball and other popular sports, and a legitimate discussion about perhaps (gulp) junking the Heal Point system altogether.

Better, in my view, to see the conferences go away completely. They’re all too big, unwieldy and geographically unsound.

With all due respect to Mr. Heal, God rest his soul, there must be somebody smarter than I am who can concoct a system that would allow a school such as Spruce Mountain to play Dirigo in basketball, Leavitt in field hockey, Mountain Valley in soccer and Mt. Blue in baseball. And allow other schools to do the same, without blowing out budgets and abandoning rivalries that make sense.

Then, when it’s over, we can have our traditional tournament and live happily ever after.

Call me crazy. But then again, you would have done that 5, 10 or 25 years ago if I told you that Jay and Livermore Falls would one day play their sports under the same roof, right?

Kalle Oakes is a staff columnist. His email is koakes@sunjournal.com. Follow him on Twitter @Oaksie72.