Injury-ravaged Davis football defends decision to forfeit to No. 1 Folsom, citing safety
Football is a tough sell at Davis High School for student athletes. It is about the only sport on the Yolo County campus that does not cause concern for opponents when the Blue Devils show up.
Low on roster numbers after eight two-way players have been sidelined, including with concussions, Davis over the weekend made the decision to not take its beleaguered team to powerhouse Folsom this Friday night, electing to forfeit against The Bee’s top-ranked team rather than risk serious bodily harm.
The Davis athletic department did say that it expects to play the final five games of the Sierra Foothill League schedule in the school’s first year in this super conference of local prep powers.
Folsom is left to scramble for a game on a night that was supposed to be homecoming, and Davis is left to defend its decision, and how a school with nearly 2,900 students cannot field a more competitive football program.
“We’re down to 21 serviceable players after injuries and we saw a scenario where we couldn’t finish the game, and that would be pretty tough,” Davis athletic director Mark McGreevy said. “We had to take a sober perspective here. To play a team of Folsom’s caliber, a fantastic program, with their size, physical ability and the physics of all of that, it became our reality that we could not in good conscious send our team there.”
McGreevy said it was a “collaborative decision” to forfeit, made by the Davis coaches, the football team trainer, the school administration and at the district office. McGreevy said Davis football “anticipated” this sort of issue could dampen the season, injuries taking a toll on a program already thin on depth and with sagging team morale that is common with mounting losses.
“We have kids who bench 150 pounds,” McGreevy said. “We’d have backups lining up against 4- and 5-star Folsom players who will play in college on Saturdays and maybe some on Sundays in the NFL. Our players want to compete, and they wanted to play this game. It’s their job is to be ready to go. Our job as adults is to make decisions that are in the best interest of our team and players, and that’s safety. This is being smart. People will get on our players and find ways to make fun of them for a football decision that we’re making, but we can deal with that. We don’t want to deal with traumatic injuries.”
Folsom’s football community has wide-ranging emotions. Though coaches and administrators said that they can feel for teams dealing with injuries in a season that saw Florin and Valley of the Elk Grove Unified School District folding their varsity programs before the first kickoff due to low roster numbers, this forfeit caught Folsom by surprise. Davis was not willing to elevate junior varsity players to deepen the varsity roster to play Folsom.
What’s more, Folsom stands to lose a lot on gate receipts and concession-stand sales, money that helps fund sports across campus. McGreevy said he can appreciate what it takes to put on a game and the benefits of playing one, but that his school had to be firm on this forfeit.
“It’s really disappointing for our players, our student body, our band, the cheerleaders and all those parents, and this was supposed to be a 50th class reunion,” Folsom vice principal Eric Eklund said. “We were in an SFL meeting last Wednesday, and nothing was brought up about forfeits. Then Sunday, our game is canceled. It’s a blow for the entire school community.”
McClatchy High in the spring notified powerhouse Grant, ranked second by The Bee and coming off back-to-back trips to a CIF state football championship, that it would not play the Pacers in the Metro League this season. The Lions cited the need to build up its program, which, like Davis, is struggling with low roster numbers. Grant was able to fill the void and this Friday will play Lincoln of San Diego.
Folsom on Monday reached out to national No. 1-ranked Mater Dei of Orange County as that team has an open date. Mater Dei pondered it but elected to remain with its off-week bye to prepare for Trinity League play in one of the toughest leagues in the country.
How Davis wound up in the SFL
Davis more than held its own in football in decades past, fielding league championship teams in the 1970s, 80s, 90s, 2000s and as recently as 2019 with a 10-2 record under outgoing coach Steve Smyte.
But for a good part of the last decade, Davis churned through coaches and endured winless or single-win seasons, finishing some seasons with fewer than 20 players, including last season when the Blue Devils went 2-8.
Davis before the start of this academic year was realigned by the CIF Sac-Joaquin Section to the SFL after decades in the Delta League, a move Davis wanted for all sports, though a bit more reluctant for the one big on blocking and tackling. The SFL happens to be the strongest and deepest football league in the section with Folsom, Granite Bay, Oak Ridge, Del Oro, Rocklin, Whitney and Jesuit, which also moved from the Delta to the SFL for the four-year realignment cycle.
Davis is not a good football fit in the SFL, but the section considers all sports for realignment and not just one of them.
Stockton power St. Mary’s in the spring offered to take Davis’ place in the SFL in football but that went nowhere. Section assistant commissioner Will DeBoard said “if schools want to go down that road, for football-only leagues, we’ll go down that road, but it hasn’t gotten there yet.”
DeBoard added that the CIF does not impose penalties on programs that forfeit football games rooted in safety concerns.
“Football is always a sport with more challenges than other sports,” DeBoard said. “A 20-0 loss in baseball is not fun, but there aren’t the health issues that you might see in football with a lopsided score. Certainly, when it comes to football, schools have to take care of their kids, and it’s something we’ve seen across the section with some schools like Modesto Christian playing with just 14 of 15 players.”
Davis started this season with 34 varsity players and has lost eight two-way starters since. Other players are hobbling. Folsom Bulldogs coaches offered to call off the dogs, per se, by playing its entire roster on Friday with limited pass routes. Davis did not accept and will use the off week to rest and recover. Folsom’s junior varsity team did find a game and will play at Twelve Bridges in Lincoln on Friday.
‘These are real people’s kids’
McGreevy attended Davis’ last game, a 44-10 loss at Whitney in Rocklin in an SFL opener. That was Whitney’s first victory. On Sept. 13, Franklin beat Davis 50-8 a year after Franklin beat the Blue Devils, 6-0.
Davis opened this season with a 46-14 loss to Del Campo, ranked by The Bee, and earned its lone win with a 42-13 effort over small-school Hiram Johnson of the Sacramento City Unified School District. Johnson was scheduled by Davis in an effort to build back up its football fortunes.
“Whitney handled us easily,” McGreevy said. “We can handle a tough score, but evaluating the risk of serious injury and being outclassed physically is the concern. We had to have the perspective that inside these pads and helmets, these are real people’s kids.”
McGreevy said Davis parents did not express concern about player safety over the weekend, but it has been a topic of conversation before. Davis parents in the spring wondered if their sons would be able to handle the rigors of the SFL, where kids grow up in those communities dreaming of playing football.
That hasn’t always been the case at Davis. For other sports? Yes. Davis as a co-ed school with nearly 150 blue banners has won more section championships in sports across the board than anyone. Davis has traditionally been strong to superb in sports such as baseball, track and field, cross country, swimming, water polo, tennis, golf and soccer.
Davis football won its lone section championship in 1988 under famed coach Dave Whitmire in an era when the Blue Devils trotted out big linemen who spent months in the weight room, including those who played in the NFL such as tight end Tony Cline and lineman Jason Fisk, whose son, Tucker Fisk, starred at Davis High and at Stanford and is a tight end with the Los Angeles Chargers.
“We have to look at it week to week but our intention is to continue the season,” McGreevy said. “This is bigger than entertainment, selling tickets. Our purpose in education-based athletics, the No. 1 thing, is safety. We can’t in good conscious send our team to Folsom.”
This story was originally published September 24, 2024 at 12:25 PM.