Western forfeits final three games

Western’s football team spent much of the week preparing to play its final home game of the season against Southwest League foe Durango on Friday.

The game never happened. And neither will the Warriors’ final two road contests.

Western’s administration, in conjunction with the Clark County School District athletic office, abruptly canceled the remainder of the football season at all levels, effective Friday morning.

The Warriors (0-7, 0-6 Southwest) forfeited Friday night’s game against Durango, next week’s game at Bishop Gorman and the scheduled season finale at Sierra Vista on Oct. 27.

“Western High School has made the difficult decision to forfeit the remaining three games of its boys varsity football schedule because the school does not have enough eligible players,” Western principal Neddy Alvarez said in an emailed statement. “We would like to thank our students and their families for their continued support throughout the 2011-12 school year.”

Alvarez did not return an email seeking further comment, and Western coach Fernando Carmona could not be reached for comment.

An email from the CCSD office Friday said Western had canceled the season at all levels, not just varsity.

Associate principal for athletics Chris Whitney cited an on-campus incident earlier in the week as a contributing factor.

“We had an incident take place on campus, and we had some students ineligible,” Whitney said. “We were looking at moving some students around to fill some holes, and with three of our biggest and toughest opponents coming up, it just made sense to make this decision.”

Whitney declined to elaborate on the incident, but a source with the knowledge of the situation said it involved several Western football players and could lead to the expulsion of more than one student.

In addition, several Western High School students said they heard multiple varsity football players had been expelled or suspended after a teasing incident got out of hand on Wednesday. As many as nine players duct-taped a senior teammate after he jokingly asked who wanted to tape him up, students said. The incident escalated, and students said those involved wouldn’t free the senior and might have taken his iPod.

The Warriors started the season with a roster short on numbers and varsity experience, with only five returning starters on offense and three on defense. Western already had shuttled several players from junior varsity to fill spots on the varsity roster.

Western was outscored 229-80 in its first six games this year.

“It’s an unusual situation,” CCSD executive athletic director Ray Mathis said. “They’ve had a shortage of players all season, and they’ve had to move players around already because of eligibility problems and injuries. Football is such a safety-minded sport. You don’t want anybody to get hurt.”

Mathis said his office was told Thursday that Western was thinking about canceling its season, but no decision was made until Friday.

“It was a joint decision,” Mathis said. “It has to do with numbers. We needed strong input and recommendation from the school. We don’t know the makeup of (what’s left of) the team.”

Football is the most high-profile sport in high school and is one of the few for which schools charge admission, meaning Gorman and Sierra Vista could stand to lose money from their now-canceled home games.

In addition, Gorman’s Oct. 21 game against Western originally was the Gaels’ homecoming. An administrator at Gorman said the Gaels have replaced the opponent with third-ranked Arbor View, which was scheduled to have a bye.

Arbor View, though, already has nine games scheduled and would be required to pay a fee to the Nevada Interscholastic Activities Association to play a Hall of Fame game for its 10th game, or have the fee waived.

Mathis said his office can’t yet confirm the game has been scheduled. The NIAA also would not confirm the game.

“We haven’t received the paperwork for it yet,” Mathis said. “Because it would be a 10th game, they’d have to get it approved.”

Review-Journal writer Jessica Fryman contributed to this report.