A third school district on Long Island is canceling its varsity football season before the school year has even begun. According to the report, the latest is Amityville, which says it has too many injured players to compete. Students will return to the high school the next day, but they will do so without a varsity football team for the upcoming year.
The district explained that the decision was driven by injuries. According to the report, officials said they had to cancel the season because they simply had too many players who were injured. The announcement came from Amityville Superintendent of Schools Gina Talbert, who addressed the situation directly as the community reacted to the news.
In a statement, the superintendent framed the move as a matter of protecting the players. According to the report, Talbert said that while the district understands the news is disappointing, it must prioritize the health and safety of its student athletes. Many of those athletes had spent the summer training and preparing for the upcoming season.
Some details about the scale of the injuries were not disclosed. According to the report, the district has not said what types of injuries were involved or what percentage of the team was out, factors it felt warranted canceling the entire season outright rather than continuing to field a team in a limited form.
The Amityville decision is not an isolated case on the island. According to the report, the news comes just days after the Port Jefferson school district abruptly ended its own varsity football season after failing to meet the 16-player minimum required to field a team for competition this year.
In Port Jefferson, there are still efforts to keep some players on the field. According to the report, there are ongoing efforts to appeal to Section 11 to merge the remaining Port Jefferson players with Rocky Point, though that process was described as still ongoing at the time of the report.
A third program had already fallen earlier in the summer. According to the report, in July, Holy Trinity High School in Hicksville also announced it had to cancel its varsity football season after the program's head coach unexpectedly resigned. Amityville officials said their focus will now be on the junior varsity season and on continuing to develop players for the future.