WASHINGTON, Mo. — Another high school football game has been canceled amid the coronavirus pandemic.
St. Francis Borgia announced on Friday morning it wouldn’t be playing its varsity football game against Parkway West.
Activities Director Chris Arand said several players at St. Francis Borgia were quarantined this week and they knew “they were going to be thin coming into the game.”
“We are really limited on lineman in our entire program, and from last night into this morning, we lost two more linemen to quarantine. It was at that time, we decided that for the safety of our players, we would need to cancel the game,” Arand said in an email. “The timing is not ideal, but we just couldn't come up with anymore lineman. We were already going to try to put a couple freshmen in there, but at some point you just have to say we can't do this.”
Arand added they feel extremely bad about this, but it is his job to do what is in the best interest of their student-athletes and the decision to not play is what they feel is the right thing to do.
He also said Parkway West was very understanding of the situation and that they talked about letting them use our field if they found an opponent.
Lutheran North football coach Carl Reed said his team will play Parkway West on Saturday at 4 p.m. at Francis Howell. The game will not be open to the public.
On Oct. 1, Lutheran High St. Charles announced it suspended its contests in varsity volleyball and football through Oct. 14 as a precautionary move following two recent positive COVID-19 tests at school, according to the school’s athletic director, Melvin Bethany.
On Sept. 23, Francis Howell announced it was postponing two of its games due to 15 players having to quarantine after being possibly exposed to the virus.
