Ripon Christian’s anticipated non-league game with East Nicolaus this Friday has been called off because of coronavirus concerns at the Sutter County school.

Knights head coach Phil Grams found out about the cancellation Tuesday night and was left scrambling for a new opponent. On Wednesday around noon, Ripon Christian locked in Sacramento as its Week 1 replacement.

Grams was looking forward to reuniting with old friends this Friday against East Nic, a Northern Section power. East Nicolaus principal and superintendent Neil Stinson announced in a letter Tuesday afternoon that the school has shut down its campus for 10 days to allow its students and staff to quarantine “due to a very recent and rapidly spreading COVID-19 outbreak.”

That, of course, means its sports teams are not allowed to hold practices and contests for the next week-plus.

Grams is friends with second-year East Nicolaus head coach Kramer Hagan, who inherited a program that won five Section titles and the Division VI-AA state championship over the previous six years under Travis Barker. Hagen and an assistant, Matt Cook, were both part of Grams’ coaching staff when they were all at Capital Christian.

“Both sides are disappointed,” Grams said. “I talked with Coach Hagen last night. We were looking forward to this. We thought it was going to happen last year but the coronavirus hit, and right when the thought we were back to the normal grind it gets cancelled again. I love those guys, and it was going to be neat to have them here and host them. We’ll get that done at some point, just not now.”

Ripon Christian (1-0) could have opted to wait a little longer and schedule a fill-in opponent for its Sept. Sept. 10 bye week, but Grams prefers to keep that break between the Knights’ final non-league game and Southern Athletic League opener.

Grams said large-school programs such as Sheldon and Vanden also reached out, but among the available opponents Sac made the most sense competitively because of their similarly small roster size. The Dragons, however, are no doubt a step up from what Ripon Christian normally faces. Sac hasn’t had a winning season since 2017 but has packed its schedule with teams in contention for Section titles in the upper divisions.  

“Sac High is very talented, but they have a 25-man roster while we have 21,” Grams said. “They have two days to prepare for something they’ve never seen just like we have two days to prepare. At the end, this is still high school football. Let’s just get these two communities together and have some fun.”

At Weston Ranch, Ron Wayman and the rest of the Cougars are excited to host their first game since Oct. 18, 2019. They had two of five games cancelled because of positive coronavirus tests during the abbreviated spring season, including their lone home game.

Both Weston Ranch and Mountain House dropped their season openers last week.

“For us, (the schedule change) just sped things up,” Wayman said of his team’s preparations for the game. “It’s the second week in a row we lost a day (of practice) because last week we took (Wednesday) off because of the smoke.

“One thing that has been really great is how much the team embraced the situation. In practice there’s an intensity to make sure we get everything done right going into tomorrow night against Mountain House.”