As the old adage goes, life isn’t always easy, and Pella Christian athletics knows this saying well competing in the Little Hawkeye Conference against much bigger schools. 

According to the Basic Educational Data Survey or BEDS Document put out by the Iowa Department of Education, Grinnell is the only school in the conference that’s 9th-11th grade enrollment doesn’t double that of Pella Christian’s. That is set to change next year when Grinnell will leave the conference. Despite a steep disadvantage in numbers, Eagles Athletic Director Dan Branderhorst believes that competing in the Little Hawkeye Conference is preparing the athletes at Pella Christian for life’s hardships.

“Life isn’t easy, sports aren’t easy, working in the weight room isn’t easy, and it’s not easy to go through one of our practices either. So, we want to do what we can to challenge ourselves for the purpose of getting better and competing well. And we want to do everything we can to obviously maximize the ability of the individuals we have here at Pella Christian. Ultimately, if we can have some level of success in our conference, we’ve seen that, then it really translates well to postseason play. But you got to be competitive in the first place, in the regular season. So, it’s not like we want to just get through that, we want to compete, and we want to win there as well.”

Currently Pella Christian ranks 167th in the state for 9th-11th grade enrollment with 200 students among the three classes this school year.