Editor’s note: This original posting of this story has been updated, with new information on the rescheduling of postponed games and two schedule changes for this weekend’s games.
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COVID-19 is not giving Interscholastic League of Honolulu football much of a break this fall.
For the third week in a row, one of the league’s scheduled games will not be played due to the coronavirus.
This week, it’s the No. 1 Saint Louis vs. No. 5 Kamehameha Open Division rivalry game — originally scheduled for Friday at Aloha Stadium — that has been postponed. No make-up date has been set.
Last week, it was the No. 1 Saint Louis vs. No. 4 Punahou game that bit the dust, with plans for it to be rescheduled later this fall.
No. 1 Saint Louis has not played since a 42-21 loss
to Bishop Gorman in Las Vegas on Aug. 20.
Two weeks before that, a scheduled Saint Louis II vs. PAC-5 Division I/II game was also postponed.
Bedrock Sports Hawaii has confirmed with officials at the schools that there were COVID-19 positive tests in all three cases.
This is the second week in a row that Saint Louis has had a game ditched. The Crusaders were able to get one game under their belt, a 42-21 loss to Nevada’s top-ranked team, Bishop Gorman, in Las Vegas on Aug. 21.
Bedrock Sports called Saint Louis assistant coach Cal Lee, now the squad’s defensive coordinator after many successful seasons as the head coach, for a comment on the disappointment of the Crusaders missing those two games.
“Unfortunately safety comes first,” Lee said.
In two ILH games Friday at Aloha Stadium, ‘Iolani (2-0) goes against Kamehameha II at 5 p.m., and PAC-5 (0-1) takes on Damien (1-1) at 7:30.
The three postponed games are not a good sign for the future of high school football this season in Hawaii.
The private-school ILH is the only one of Hawaii’s five leagues playing games so far, with the four other leagues inactive due to COVID-19.
A full slate of games in all of Hawaii’s leagues from August through November was supposed to begin Aug. 6, but the Department of Education announced a few days before that day that public school teams in all fall sports would not be able to start until all student-athletes had a chance to be vaccinated. The DOE then set a Sept. 24 restart of training camps.
Soon after, the OIA and neighbor island leagues began to release revamped, shorter versions of their football schedules, with regular season games starting Oct. 15 and ending in early December.
Meanwhile, at about the same time, th eILH came up with a revamped schedule of its own, with its regular season starting Aug. 27 and ending in mid-October — about the same time the OIA and neighbor island leagues will be starting official regular season games. The hope was, and still is, that league playoffs and a state tournament can be held in December and early January.
Wendell Look, the ILH football coordinator, told HawaiiPrepWorld.com in a Wednesday story that the league hopes to fit the postponed games in at the back end of its regular season schedule.
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RELATED ILH FOOTBALL STORIES AT BedrockSportsHawaii.com:
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>> Sharp ‘Iolani Football Team Improves To 2-0 By Steamrolling PAC-5, 46-7
>> Damien Enters The Win Column By Upending Kamehameha II, 25-20
>> In Opening Loss, PAC-5’s Grit And Determination Is Personified By Joshua Arcayena And Neivyn Kahoopii
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