MORGANTOWN – According to Trinity Christian School athletic director Codey Horton, the school will be pausing activities for the football program due to a lack of interested players.
The Warriors went 6-4 last year and 7-3 in 2021. Horton says the concern came about as early as April of this year and that the decision is being made with the players safety in mind first.
“The safety for our kids was the biggest decision for us,” Horton said on Tuesday. “The past few years we’ve been able to have 15-17 kids on the team, and even then we had safety in mind, but we got through and were able to have a team.”
Horton says he believes 17 players is the minimum to be able to sustain a high school football season, but throughout the summer that number changed to 15 for him as the team showed some life during the three-week period. As fall camp was about to begin, Horton said only eight players showed up at the initial team meeting.
Jason White was hired in February and was set to become a first-year head coach for the program.
“During the three-week period we talked to some kids and some families to try it out and were able to get up to 13,” Horton said. “But realistically we needed more bodies in order to actually have a practice.”
That’s when Horton said he realized he needed to make a decision on whether or not to even allow the team to begin, as players would be able to play for another school as long as they hadn’t begun practicing in the fall with Trinity.
“I talked to Wayne Ryan with the WVSSAC and he told me that once a student starts practice with one team, they’re not eligible for that sport anywhere else,” Horton said. “So, coach Jason White and I decided to hold a meeting this past Monday and told ourselves if we had 15 players show that we would have the season, but only eight showed. We told them the options that they had and that it was in their best interest.”
Students will be able to try out for the football team at the school within their district. With Trinity being a private school, the students may all live in different school districts, whether it be Morgantown, University, Clay-Battelle, or even Preston High.
Trinity had 10 games scheduled for the 2023 season, beginning with a road game at Paden City on Aug. 25. According to the WVSSAC web site, all 10 games have been marked as “cancelled.”
Horton said the school would look to field a team in 2024, if enough there was enough interest.
