The following letter was sent by Unatego CSD to its football families. We are sharing, as we have students who played on the football team that merged with Unatego.
To: Unatego Varsity Football players and families
From: Matt Hafele, Athletic Director and Frank Microni, Head Coach
Date: October 30, 2024
Re: Football Post Season Competition
In order to provide our team and their families with as much accurate information as possible about the recent Section IV decision to prohibit our merged team from post-season competition, we are sending out this message.
On or about August 20, 2024, we learned that Unadilla Valley-GMU could not field a team, and they asked us if they could merge with Unatego-Franklin. We understood that the combined enrollment of the four schools would increase our total enrollment for classification puproses, but in the interests of the student-athletes from all four schools, we agreed to submit the merger paperwork which was approved by Section IV on or about August 23.
More than a week later, and after the season had already started, Section IV informed the four schools that the merged team would be ineligible for Post-Season play due to a rule adopted by NYSPHSAA in May of 2022 which restricted Post-Season play for 8 man football to Class C and D teams only.
Since none of the four schools were aware of the rule, and in the two years since the adoption of the rule by the State Executive Committee it was never added to either the NYSPHSAA or Section IV Football Handbooks (and is still not included in the handbooks as of today) we protested the decision to Section IV. The appeal was denied.
After further discussion and consideration, we filed a second appeal, which was also denied.
The four school districts, while they disagree with the decision for a variety of reasons, have no further recourse. We all did what we considered to be in the best interests of our student athletes to allow them to participate in their sport of choice and were penalized for it. In the future we will continue to make decisions in the best interests of kids.