RIPON — Ripon Christian practiced and worked out as planned, following that up with their weekly Thursday-night, pre-game team dinner.
Only, there won’t be a game tonight — not for the growingly-antsy Knights, anyway.
Following a first-round bye, the third-seeded team in the Sac-Joaquin Section Division VI playoffs was scheduled to face No. 6 Calaveras for a much-anticipated quarterfinal between two small-school powers that had never before faced off. Calaveras has been forced to forfeit the game for use of an illegal player in its opening-round victory over Western Sierra.
Knights coaches and players will instead head down to Hilmar tonight to watch the familiar No. 2 Yellowjackets (9-1) tangle with No. 7 Bear River (8-3) of Grass Valley. They’ll play the winner in their third straight appearance in the semifinals next week.
“My stomach felt sick for Calaveras’ team, for the players, the coaching staff, the administration, the community,” Ripon Christian coach Randy Fasani said Thursday as his. “It must be the worst feeling ever, but I give coach (Doug) Clark a lot of credit for how he handled it.”
Clark and Calaveras administration self-reported an innocent clerical error involving the ineligible athlete, who was not yet qualified to participate in a varsity game because of California Interscholastic Federation transfer rules.
The player is a sophomore who transferred to Calaveras late last school year and played for the junior varsity during the regular season. He was promoted to the varsity for the playoffs and entered last week’s contest with the game virtually decided.
Calaveras celebrated the 56-13 triumph and shifted its focus on Ripon Christian. On Wednesday during practice, Calaveras administrators met with the coaches and players to inform them that the SJS had penalized them for the error.
The Calaveras Enterprise broke the news soon after, releasing its report on social media. Fasani said Ripon Christian athletic director Kevin Tameling told him about the cancellation following the Knights’ practice Wednesday. They intended to withhold this information from the team until Thursday, awaiting a public announcement from the section first.
It wasn’t a secret for long.
“I saw something on Twitter and I sent it to coach Randy and asked if it was real because I thought it was a joke,” Ripon Christian senior quarterback Nolan Lingley said. “I was distraught for the Calaveras seniors as well as our team. It’s not fair to them, the players especially. I don’t think they should have been punished as a team and have their game taken away, but (the SJS) has their bylaws and they have to do what they have to do.”
Calaveras is part of a three-way stake of the Mother Lode League championship and concludes its season with an 8-4 record. Ripon Christian moves to 10-1 without having played a down since clinching its second-straight outright title in the Southern League with a 49-0 win at winless Delhi on Nov. 1.
“It’s been tough,” junior lineman Todd Beatty II said of the extended layoff. “We worked our butts off this season to get that bye and we were glad to get it, but this is going to be a challenge. It’s going to be 22 days exactly since we last played a game when we go into next Friday.”
Beatty himself is a transfer and empathizes for the ineligible player and the rest of Calaveras. He arrived from Stockton powerhouse St. Mary’s, while fellow lineman Seth Gallo transferred from nearby Modesto Christian. Both observed the sit-out period and missed the first five games of the season.
Del Oro and Jesuit, renowned upper-division programs from the northern part of the section, had to forfeit postseason games last year for using ineligible players in blowout wins. Del Oro ultimately vacated its SJS Division II and CIF Northern California Division I-A titles.
Fasani, a star quarterback for Del Oro in the 1990s, said those instances made him overly cautious when it came to the eligibility of his new players.
“I felt bad for Kevin Tameling,” Fasani said. “I was probably annoying.”
For his players, an opportunity was lost to further boost the prestige of a program longing for respect. Ripon Christian advanced to three SJS championship games in recent years but still lacks a section title.
“I felt like that was going to be a great matchup and a great test for us,” Lingley said. “We were going to be able to prove ourselves with people saying that the Southern League is weak or whatever, but it was going to be a fun game. It sucks that we won’t be able to go through with it.”
Ripon Christian may have a shot at redemption after losing to eventual state champion Hilmar 57-14 in the SJS Division VI championship last season. The Knights are trying their best to be ready regardless of the opponent.
“It’s tough for Division I college players to go three weeks without playing a game and stay focus and motivated,” said Fasani, who played for Stanford and four NFL teams. “It’s tough for NFL players to do that, let alone high school sophomores, juniors and seniors to work hard every single practice and grind and yet not play a game for three weeks.
“Then you have to go face either Bear River or Hilmar, a storied program from the north or an amazing program with a bunch of tradition from the south. It’s a big disadvantage for us having a 22-day lapse between games, but we’re not complaining. It is what it is.”