Sprint Football: Squad forfeits against Navy due to lack of healthy players

The sprint football team forfeited its home game against Navy scheduled for last Friday night, saying in an announcement on Wednesday that the team had an insufficient number of healthy players to safely compete. The last game the team forfeited was a home matchup against Army in October 2007.

“The athletic department, in conjunction with athletic medicine, felt it was prudent not to play this game due to the small number of available players,” Director of Athletics Gary Walters ’67 said in a statement.

In last week’s 48-0 trampling at Post, the Tigers (0-6 overall, 0-5 CSFL) lost at least three starters and team leaders to injuries. Junior quarterback Jaison Zachariah left after the first half with bruised ribs, while senior linebacker Atray Dixit and senior defensive back Rob Parise left in the third quarter with back and hand injuries, respectively. Both Dixit and Parise are team captains.

Head coach Stephen Everette said that 11 of the team’s 31 official members were injured and that six or seven of those 11 players had a “50/50” chance of being healthy by the end of that week. Though Everette said that he could have technically fielded a team, he explained that it was unsafe for the team to enter a game with so few active players.

“You don’t go into a game where you don’t have backups or with players playing positions where they haven’t really practiced,” he said. “I’m not going to let my pride or anyone else’s pride or ego to get in the way of our guys being safe.”

Everette said he started pondering a forfeit on Sunday afternoon after realizing the extent of his players’ injuries. After meeting with trainers and the team doctor, Everette ultimately made the decision. The team was initially “dejected” by his announcement, he said, but they eventually understood his position.

“There were some guys that were disappointed, but once they saw the whole entire picture and they saw the entire rationale behind the decision, they respected my decision,” Everette said.

Multiple players did not respond to requests for comment.

The Midshipmen (5-0, 4-0) have outscored the Tigers 400-0 over the past six years. The last time the Tigers scored in a game against Navy was in a 61-20 loss in 2004.

In the announcement, the University’s athletic communications office said that Princeton “hopes to be able to play” its next game against Penn on Nov. 4. Everette said that the Tigers should be able to field a team for their game in two weeks’ time.

“If we’re healthy, we’ll play against Penn — and we should be healthy,” he said.