Carrboro forfeits Friday’s football game against Bartlett Yancey

Carrboro High School will forfeit its Mid-State 2A Conference football game with Bartlett Yancey, the school’s athletics director announced Wednesday night.

Carrboro (0-7, 0-1 Mid-State) had been scheduled to host Bartlett Yancey (3-3, 0-1) Friday night.

“The decision was based on the safety and the well being of our athletes,” Carrboro Athletics Director April Ross wrote in an email. “We will not make up the game at this time. Our plan is to continue football on October 23 versus Graham based on a safe number of participants who can play.”

Carrboro football head coach Melvin Griffin said his team had been able to compete until it lost 50-0 Oct. 9 at Burlington Cummings.

“We played against Cummings with 19 players and lost three to injury,” Griffin said. “We have only 16 athletes for practice this week.”

Griffin said four players were expected to return to practice next week, giving the Jaguars 20 healthy players to take the field Oct. 23 at home against Graham (1-6, 0-1).

“The game with Graham is still on,” he said.

Carrboro’s decision marks the second time in less than a year that a local team has felt compelled to forfeit a football game. East Chapel Hill went 0-11 last year after citing a lack of healthy players and forfeiting three of its last four games.

The Jaguars’ forfeit will give them an eighth straight loss and extend the schools current winless streak in football to 12 games. After defeating Bartlett Yancey 32-12 last year, Carrboro lost four straight at the end of its 2014 season.

This story was originally published October 15, 2015 at 4:39 PM with the headline "Carrboro forfeits Friday’s football game against Bartlett Yancey."