JSerra’s football team will not have to forfeit its win Friday over Santa Margarita.
JSerra had suited up a player who had been ejected from the previous day’s junior varsity game. An ejected player cannot be in attendance at the next contest.
Here is what the CIF-Southern Section and Commissioner Rob Wigod sent us this morning:
After reviewing all of the information we obtained from all parties involved, I have decided that I am not going to overturn the result of the JSerra-Santa Margarita football game last Friday night and award Santa Margarita High School a forfeit victory.
“I do so for the following reasons…
1) JSerra High School contacted our office last Friday seeking clarification on whether one of their JV players was ejected from the previous day’s JV game. They did so because they were not sure if their player was ejected from the contest or not. I believe they would not have contacted our office at all if it had been clearly communicated to them that their player was ejected from the JV contest.
2) Our office was not able to give them a definitive answer to that question as there was no Misconduct Form entered into the CIFSSHome system when they contacted our office.
3) JSerra was instructed to try and contact the official who worked the JV game the previous day to try and get direct clarification from him.
4) They were not able to get in touch with the official involved to get their question answered.
5) They did make contact with Orange County Area Officials Liaison Speed Castillo, who directed them not to play the player in question if they were unsure of his status. While that is a reasonable suggestion, that is still not a definitive answer to their question seeking clarification. That is no fault of Mr. Castillo.
6) In further investigating the absence of the Misconduct Report, it has been determined that the official who ejected the players from both schools did not submit the Misconduct Form properly into the CIFSSHome system.
7) We are responsible and accountable for the misunderstanding that JSerra High School had when they contacted our office last Friday, in terms of the failure to properly report the ejection and file the appropriate Misconduct Report in a timely manner. We have to recognize that there were errors made in not clearly communicating to JSerra High School in advance of Friday night’s Varsity contest that the player they asked about was in fact ejected, or not ejected, from their JV contest on Thursday.
8) I believe that JSerra High School contacted our office in good faith last Friday to specifically try and avoid any potential problems by having this player present at the Varsity contest on Friday night.
I believe that our member schools have to be able to trust the fact that when they seek help from our office, they will get that help. I never want to be in a situation where our member schools look to us for guidance and still suffer consequences after making an honest effort to not violate our rules and avoid those consequences.
We will have no further comment beyond this.
