Player’s Ineligibility Costs Cypress Shot at League Title

Cypress Coach Dave King thought he had done everything right. He talked to Kerry Crabb, his athletic director. They read the Southern Section rule book together. Everything looked copacetic. However, the day after his team rolled to any easy 2-0 victory over Loara in an Empire League game, King, in his first year at Cypress, received the disappointing news.

Loara Coach Scott Weber had filed a protest with the Empire League, citing illegal participation by Cypress’ Amanda Hiar, who, two games before, had received a red card during a game against El Dorado.

The Southern Section rule book states a red-carded player must sit out the team’s next game, which for Cypress was against Century. Hiar was prepared to miss the game, but the morning of the contest a Century athletic director called Crabb and said its varsity team was forfeiting the match for disciplinary reasons.

Since Cypress was awarded a victory, King assumed it counted toward Hiar’s suspension.

“The rule states a player has to sit out the next game,” King said. “Century was our next game.”

A few days after Weber’s protest was filed with league officials, King found out he’d lost the battle.

“I feel terrible,” King said. “We still would have rolled over them without Hiar. I feel like I did something wrong. I couldn’t actually break the news to them. I had our athletic director do it.

“As soon as Kerry started talking, I saw tears well up in Amanda’s eyes. I just went to her, grabbed her and pulled her aside. It’s not her fault. We screwed up, not the girls, but they are paying for it.”

King was confused about the ruling because last week, when the Orange boys’ basketball team had nine players suspended for fighting, the team was not allowed to forfeit its next game. The Panthers were forced to bring up junior varsity players to fill out the squad; Century was not.

King was told Monday morning that since the forfeit wasn’t reported to the Southern Section on game day, nothing could be done by the section and it was in the hands of the league’s administrators, who ruled that Cypress must forfeit its victory over Loara.

“I know he didn’t do it on purpose,” Weber said of King. “But, their athletic director didn’t do what he should have. My athletic director would have called CIF to make sure.”

Hardest for King to swallow was that his team also lost its position to battle for the league title. It was supposed to come down to Thursday’s final match against El Dorado, which, before the forfeit, led the Centurions (13-5-2, 7-2) by only one point in the standings.

Loara was out of the picture, until Weber’s protest. Now Loara (18-2-1, 6-1-1) still has a chance at the title, if it can beat El Dorado (12-7-2, 7-0-1) today. They tied, 1-1, in Round 1.

“I will play Scott any time, any day,” King said. “He can pick the players he wants me to use and we’ll still beat them.”

Said Weber, when told of King’s comments: “I’d play them again. I don’t know if it would be approved, but I don’t want to win a game like that. It should be won on the field.”

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