SCE closure puts Cross-town Classic in limbo

With St. Charles East gunning for an undefeated Upstate Eight season in coach Mike Fields' first year as head coach, Friday night's Cross-town Classic against St. Charles North promised to be a matchup nobody would soon forget.

Turns out it is indeed going to be one people are talking about years from now, only not for what happened on the field.

The flu outbreak at St. Charles East this week that left 911 students absent Tuesday forced officials to cancel or postpone athletic events the rest of the week, including Friday's annual cross-town football game.

"It couldn't happen at a worse time," Fields said. "But it is what it is. It's another obstacle in these guys' resilient season."

When - or if, or where - that game gets played is unknown at this time.

"We don't know yet," Fields said. "Hopefully we'll find out tomorrow."

Moving the game to Saturday would seem to be realistic, though there also are complications with that date. St. Charles East is hosting a boys soccer regional championship starting at 3 p.m.

"We are not sure what's going to happen," said St. Charles East athletic director Jerry Krieg. "Saturday's a possibility, but that's something we're going to discuss over the next few days."

St. Charles North coach Mark Gould, who has seen nothing at his school like his District 303 brethren have experienced, is obviously in the same boat.

"We're up in the air, just kind of waiting to see what the call's going to be," Gould said.

IHSA executive director Marty Hickman said he thought the game will be called a no-contest if it isn't able to be played. "I'll speak to (football administrator) Dave Gannaway in the morning but my guess would be we would call it a no-contest, unless North would want to press the forfeit issue, which being an in-district school I would hope they wouldn't do," said Hickman, who was unaware St. Charles East had closed until contacted by the Daily Herald after he had left the IHSA's Bloomington office for the day.

"They have to play eight games to be playoff eligible and they've both done that. If they want to play Monday we would probably say fine but we would go ahead with playoff pairings Saturday night based on the results of their eight games."

Hickman also said the IHSA wouldn't stand in the way of other SCE athletes participating in athletics this week, if the district would deem them healthy enough. That would include soccer regionals, state tennis and regional cross country participants.

St. Charles East boys cross country coach Chris Bosworth said his team had two runners sick, but they are "getting better by the hour" and the Saints will be ready for the regional Saturday.

"We'd leave that to the discretion of the district," Hickman said.

Krieg said he has not spoken with St. Charles North about playing the game there.

"It just keeps coming, so we'll figure it out," Krieg said. "We're still hoping to play where it should be played.

"Because of the absenteeism we're going to sit back, take a look and catch our breath. When we get done tonight (with the regional soccer game), starting tomorrow we're going to shut down for three days, see if anything can be done Saturday."

Fields said 12-14 players missed practice Tuesday with "flu-like symptoms." With both St. Charles East and St. Charles North bringing 6-2 records into the game, Fields cited the importance of a seventh win regarding the "huge advantage" of a possible home playoff game. The Saints are 6-0 in the Upstate Eight and have clinched at least a share of the conference title.

"I'm not even talking about the cross-town part of it," Fields said. "It's an undefeated conference championship for us. This is one of our goals and we want to be able to accomplish one more of our goals."

Fields said the Kane County Health Department told the St. Charles East administration that afflicted students need four days for this flu to get through their system before the end of the contagious period, which is why they're getting Wednesday through Friday off.

"Personally, I think it's a great decision by the administration, for the kids' standpoint. But for us, it couldn't come at a worse time," Fields said.

"I support their decision 100 percent. I tell the boys all the time you can't worry about what you can't control, and this is one of those things."

John Radtke contributed to this story.