Smoke from fires postpones high school playoff football games
They’d been waiting two weeks for one of the most anticipated Bay Area football games of the season.
The Lions of Liberty-Brentwood had a team breakfast Saturday morning, then a walk-through. “Everyone was prepared and dialed in,” Liberty coach Ryan Partridge said. “We were ready to go.”
But around 1 p.m. — “12:52 to be exact,” Partridge said — he got the call. The North Coast Section Open Division semifinal game at home with Clayton Valley-Concord to decide a state playoff was postponed until 7 p.m. Monday due to poor air quality from the Camp Fire in Butte County.
“The kids were bummed,” Partridge said. “Now we’re just trying to change their mind-set. It’s another life lesson. They know it could be way worse. They could be in Paradise.”
The lessons and perspective continued for young athletes throughout the Bay Area on Saturday. Eleven of 12 NCS and Central Coast Section playoff games scheduled for Saturday were postponed until Monday.
The only football game played Saturday was in Carmel, where the host Padres beat Mount Pleasant-San Jose 54-21 in a CCS Division 5 contest.
Two Academic Athletic Association regular-season finales — Balboa at Galileo and Mission at Burton — were canceled and won’t be made up. The San Francisco Section’s semifinals are now scheduled for 2 p.m. Thursday: Balboa at Lincoln and Mission at Galileo.
SFS Commissioner Don Collins said the air quality index read 163 in San Francisco on Saturday morning. The rule for NCS and SFS is that teams can’t play when the reading is 150 or above. Now Monday is loaded with a full slate of quarterfinal games: 15 CCS contests and 20 NCS games, all at 4, 6 or 7 p.m.
“Luckily it’s a school holiday,” Clayton Valley coach Tim Murphy said. “We’ll meet at school, tape and keep the exact plan that we had for today.”
The NCS’ Open division is the only four-team bracket in the section, and each of the four teams received a first-round bye. The Liberty-Clayton Valley winner plays De La Salle-Concord, a 38-0 winner over Pittsburg on Friday, when just nine NCS and CCS games were played.
“There’s a lot of anxiety waiting, but I told the kids to just relax and be around family,” Murphy said. “It’s a test of patience, for sure.”
There could be even a longer wait. There’s no guarantee that the air quality will improve by Monday. Then what?
“If we have to play Tuesday, we’ll play Tuesday,” Partridge said.
Said Lemmon: “As awful as it has been for staff and all involved, we keep thinking about the people who have lost their homes and lives in Paradise. Now that’s truly terrible.”
MaxPreps senior writer Mitch Stephens covers high school sports for The San Francisco Chronicle.