WOODBURY – After Northwest United’s 42-7 loss to ATI on Thanksgiving Eve, the Workhorses would’ve never thought that was their last game of the season.
After this game, many players were checking who they were going to play in the Class MM state playoffs, which would have been one of the biggest games of their careers.
Northwest United drew a game against Windsor, the No. 1-ranked team in the state poll. But with having several players injured against ATI – senior right tackle Janos Kobylarz and three wide receivers: senior Reed Woerner, R.J. Barksdale, and junior Derek Chung – head coach Jennifer Garzone met with defensive coordinator Tyrone Breece and line coach Jeff Kimball to make a difficult decision.
The difficult decision was to forfeit the game due to lack of players and for the players’ safety. It is believed to be the first time a team has opted to forfeit a CIAC playoff game since the inception of divisional tournaments in 1976, according to Patch.
“It was a very hard decision but we had a very thin roster for the last two months of the season,” Garzone said. “This isn’t like golf where there’s no contact involved; this is a game of physicality. I know it was the right decision. Injuries and illness [were] a big part of the forfeit.”
Some of the players, like junior quarterback Brady Herman, agreed with Garzone and thought it was for the best.
“It was a hard decision for the coaches,” said Herman. “I don’t think there’s a right or wrong answer here, but there’s definitely points from both sides of why or why not we should have forfeited. I think whatever decision that would have been made in the end was the right decision”
Some players wished they could play but agreed with their coach’s decision to forfeit.
“I would have loved to play, but I support any decision that our coaches and teammates make,” junior center Rocco Varrone said. “I don’t hate but I don’t like what happened, but I do see both sides of the story.”
Other players, like senior defensive lineman Tristan Van Dyke, think NWU should have played.
“We should have played,” said Van Dyke. Just because they are a tougher opponent than we are used to doesn’t mean we should just forfeit,It’s not fair to the kids who want to play. I know we are missing some pieces to our team, but that’s why we got those kids to move up from JV to varsity. The team has had a lot of ups and downs this year, but I wasn’t expecting [to] forfeit. I simply didn’t want to. It’s another game for the kids to play. I get it, Windsor is the best team in the state, but how do we know where we rank if we never played a school like this? I’m obviously not a coach, I don’t see what they see, but from a player’s perspective, we should have played this game. I have confidence in my team.”
Junior running back and safety Davion Joe agreed with Van Dyke.
“I feel like it wasn’t fair to the kids who wanted to play and that practice the whole year just for us to forfeit the last game,” Joe said. “Football isn’t a sport that you quit because people are injured or bigger than you.”
