Henry Clay boys’ soccer self-reports ineligible player, forfeits six games
Henry Clay’s boys’ soccer team has been forced to forfeit six games this season after self-reporting an ineligible player to the Kentucky High School Athletic Association last month.
“We played a 19-year-old without knowing,” Henry Clay Coach Jason Behler told the Herald-Leader.
The player, a senior who turned 19 before the KHSAA’s Aug. 1 cutoff date, played in eight of Henry Clay’s first nine games, notching a team-high eight goals and an assist.
Behler said the oversight came as a result of confusion over the player’s paperwork with the school and with the KHSAA since the he is older than a typical student at his grade level.
“He came to us a year ago, and I looked at his physical then and I put him in our roster as a 12th-grader because his birth year was 2003,” Behler said. “... There’s no place to put the birth date in on KHSAA when you put people on your roster. … So, about halfway through (last) year, when I’m not looking at physicals or anything else, he’s like, ‘Coach, I’m only an 11th-grader.’”
Not thinking anything of it at the time, Behler changed the player back to a junior on the KHSAA roster without double-checking his birth date for the age rule. When the player returned for his senior season, Behler didn’t think to look at the birth year on the player’s physical this time around.
“There’s no excuse for it. I should have caught it,” Behler said. “But because he was a player last year … It just completely was off my radar.”
Behler finally noticed the mistake during the first grade check of the season last month. Those documents have the players’ birth dates right next to their names, Behler said.
“I realized it was 2003,” Behler said. “And I was like, ‘Yeah, that’s too old.’ And that was it.”
Behler said he’s putting in more safeguards to prevent something like this from happening again.
“Ultimately, it’s on me. I don’t make any excuses for it,” Behler said. “I broke it to the team and I was like, ‘This is my fault. And I apologize.’ I felt worse than anything telling the kid. All he wanted to do was play with his friends for his senior year.”
The forfeits, formerly four wins and two draws, included blowout victories over 42nd District foes Sayre and Scott County. They appeared on Henry Clay’s online KHSAA schedule on Wednesday afternoon.
The forfeits also mean the three-time state champions will be the lowest seed in next month’s district playoffs. Henry Clay (2-13-1) will face Sayre (5-6-2) for the right to take on top-seeded Frederick Douglass (12-0-2) in the district semifinals. The Broncos are the No. 5 team in the state according to the latest Maher Rankings. A loss to Douglass would mean Henry Clay would miss the region tournament for the first time since 2009.
