Joe Vas was to have appealed Monday to Section XI’s athletic council, a body comprising 22 fellow athletic directors, urging the council to let East Hampton High’s varsity football team stay one more year in Division IV, a lower-enrollment division in which the rebuilding Bonackers were placed two years ago.
East Hampton failed to field a varsity or a junior varsity football team in 2017, the sole school in Suffolk aside from Southampton to do so in recent memory, prompting Joe McKee to undertake a rebuild. He coached junior varsity teams in Division IV in 2018 and 2019, and oversaw 1-4 and 2-6 Division IV varsity entries last spring and last fall that played such teams as Miller Place, Port Jefferson, Center Moriches, John Glenn, and Wyandanch.
When it comes to enrollment East Hampton ought to be in Division III, with such schools as Sayville, Comsewogue, East Islip, Deer Park, and Westhampton Beach. Vas said Friday that while East Hampton’s numbers were good, the players still lacked the experience to warrant a move up to Division III — an opinion with which McKee, citing East Hampton’s records in the past two season as prima facie evidence, agrees.
East Hampton’s athletic director made that point at the end of last month with the four football divisions’ athletic directors after having received in February the placement committee’s okay, but while those A.D.s in Division III and IV agreed, those in Division I and II — the ones for large schools — did not, he said.
“When it came to a roll call, we were outvoted 31-20,” said Vas, who, with Adam Fine, the East Hampton School District superintendent, the high school’s principal, Sara Smith, McKee, and Jackie Lowey, as a representative of the school board, appealed that decision to Section XI’s appeals committee (three representatives from AA schools), which also turned thumbs down.
In relaying the news via email, Tom Combs, the executive director of Section XI, which oversees public high school sports in Suffolk, told Vas that “the committee stated that the numbers of the program are in line or above other programs in Division 3. As a 14 seed in Division 3, relief within the schedule allows for continued growth of the program.”
“As your program is on the road to success with the inclusion of outside programs and improved coaching techniques, continue to strive for the appreciation of the sport of football within the community.”
Combs added that “the athletic council shall have the power to affirm, modify, or reverse the decision of the appeals committee.”
Vas said he expected to receive a fairer hearing from the countywide athletic council.
And if the athletic council says East Hampton would have to move up to Division III? “Then we’ve got to do it,” he said.
It was the prospect of moving up to Division III that resulted in East Hampton’s inability to field a varsity football team in 2017, McKee said. “We had 24 signed up. Seven showed up on the first day of practice.”