Published: September 02, 2008 02:05 pm         

Fort Hill to play nine-game season

Scheduling error causes Sentinels to lose game; Oct. 3 now open date

CUMBERLAND — Due to a scheduling error, the Fort Hill football team will now play a nine-game schedule rather than a 10-game schedule this season.

The Sentinels’ Saturday, Sept. 27 home game with Southern Garrett is no longer on the schedule, while their home game with Cambridge-South Dorchester, originally scheduled for Friday, Oct. 3, will now be played Friday, Sept. 26, 2 p.m., at Greenway Avenue Stadium.

The originally-scheduled game at Greenway for Sept. 26, Keyser at Allegany, will be played at 7:30 p.m., with Allegany agreeing to move the kickoff back 30 minutes to accommodate the Fort Hill-Cambridge game. Greenway Avenue Stadium will be completely cleared between the games.

According to Fort Hill athletic director Paul Green, in an effort to find a week on the schedule for the Sentinels’ game with Dunbar, of Washington, D.C., he believed he and the athletic director of Cambridge-South Dorchester had agreed for the Vikings and the Sentinels to play this year’s game, the second on a two-year contract, on Friday, Oct. 3 or Saturday, Oct. 4. Green, however, realized last Thursday that wasn’t the case as he said he did not mail a new contract to Cambridge at the time he believed the two schools had reached said agreement.

Green then went about trying to re-arrange the schedule so that all three teams would still be able to play and maintain 10-game schedules. All but Fort Hill have maintained 10-game schedules, as Southern was able to pick up a game with Hancock for the weekend of Sept. 26-27.

“It’s one person’s fault,” said Green. “It’s my fault, and I will apologize to everybody. I feel terrible for Todd (Appel, the Fort Hill head coach). Here it is his first year and he only has a nine-game schedule. I feel terrible for the kids because they work so hard and now they have only nine games to play. And I feel terrible for Steve (Lewis, the Fort Hill principal). He lost a home game and the revenue that comes with that gate.

“I take full responsibility for this. It was my error, and I apologize to everybody for making it.”

Contact Mike Burke at mburke@times-news.com.