Castillo gave the association 30 days to take the new classification system to the State Board of Education. The OSAA said it would do so.

Her ruling did not address the merits of increasing the number of classes from four to six.

The OSAA said it was increasing the number of classes to foster competitive balance: Schools of more nearly equal size would be playing each other more often.

Critics of the idea from Eugene, Medford and Salem said it would require student-athletes to spend more time on buses traveling to and from games.

Castillo's decision dealt only with how the OSAA went about making the change. A statement from her office said the OSAA "failed to obtain approval of the State Board of Education prior to placing schools into new districts," violating a 2003 state law requiring the approval.

The 2003 law followed a dispute over which league the Hood River Valley High School would play in, participants in the current dispute said.

The OSAA is comprised of Oregon schools who send representatives to govern the body through a delegate assembly and an executive board. The association's staff is headquartered in Wilsonville.

Its executive director, Tom Welter, said the group had gone to the state board in September for approval of the criteria it used to set up its classification and districts. The criteria include such factors as geography, travel costs, enrollment and athletic history.

"We thought that's what the bill required," he said.

Welter said the association remains confident in the merits of the reclassification proposal. The OSAA's delegates voted 30-1 in September in favor of the six-class setup.

"This is something the schools want," he said.

Joel DeVore, a Eugene lawyer representing the local school district, said he hoped the OSAA would listen to Castillo's decision and drop its plan.

He said the idea would be costly for the local schools. It would mean more than $60,000 a year in additional fuel and the loss of $50,000 in ticket sales as the Eugene schools travel farther for games. Fans who would go across town for a game will be less likely to drive to Medford, he said.

More important, he said, is the toll such travel will take on students, who will more often be arriving home after midnight from a road trip.

"The next day, they are sitting around groggy, not doing too super-well in school," he said.

(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)