More News

A Charles County Public Schools hearing Monday determined the Westlake High School football team unknowingly used an ineligible player in four games during the regular season. Though Westlake was forced to forfeit two regular season wins, the team will be permitted to play in the 3A South Region title game Friday.

Potomac High of Oxon Hill, which lost 30-12 to Westlake in a 3A South Region semifinal game last Friday, had been prepared to play in Westlake's place if the Waldorf school had been ruled out of the playoffs.

With the outcome of the case unsettled on Monday, Potomac held a practice in the afternoon. But coach Chris Davidson said Prince George's Schools Athletic Director Earl Hawkins informed him of the ruling at about 6 p.m. Monday.

"We were thrust into the middle of this thing, and all we were trying to do is keep the ship righted until the waters calmed," Davidson said. "We were disappointed in how the season ended, and we wished we would have played better against Westlake. We didn't win our way into the next round, and we don't want to be accused of taking something that didn't belong to us."

The ineligible player, who sources say was zoned to attend Friendly High School in Fort Washington, played for Westlake in four games from Sept. 25 through Oct. 16. According to a statement issued Monday by the Charles County Schools, during that span the player was living with a relative who was not a legal guardian, making him ineligible to play.

Westlake lost two of the four games, dropping its regular season record to 6-4. Westlake was not dismissed from the playoffs because the team still would have qualified for the postseason with a 6-4 record. The Wolverines will visit Huntingtown in the 3A South Region final on Friday.

"Technically, it appears the school unknowingly allowed an ineligible player to participate in football games during the fall sports season for 2009-10," concluded the Charles County Schools hearing committee, comprised of deputy superintendent Ronald G. Cunningham and a panel of two others from his office. "The school and the coach took reasonable measures to verify his residence, and Charles County Public Schools Department of Student Services was involved in these efforts. Information provided by the mother in October indicates she moved out of the county sometime in September. She left her son behind at her previous legal residence in the care of a relative, who is not a legal guardian.  

"Therefore, he is not a legal Charles County resident and ineligible to attend a Charles County public school or participate in Maryland Public Secondary Schools Athletic Association-sanctioned events."

Westlake coach Dominic Zaccarelli could not be reached after it was learned that the forfeits had no bearing on his team's playoff fate.

"I'll still contend, we did not play an ineligible player. The documents will confirm that," Zaccarelli said previously. "I believe that all the documentation will go into ruling in our favor [at the appeals hearing]. I have no doubt, or maybe it's blind faith, when we get in front of that committee that everything we've done will prove to be on the up-and-up. The decision to have Westlake forfeit games is incorrect."

He added, "Every step of the way, myself, my principal and my [pupil personnel worker] didn't hide anything. We turned everything over to the appropriate people at the Board of Ed, and at that time, I believed everything would turn out in our favor."

Zaccarelli would not get into the specifics of his case, nor would he confirm the name of the player involved in the situation.

"We believe the coach, the school and the school system did everything possible to verify the student's residency and that no one knowingly allowed an ineligible student to play," Cunningham said in a Charles County Schools press release. "State rules, however, list forfeiture as the first sanction and we do not believe they distinguish between knowingly or unknowingly."

Staff Writer Seth Elkin

contributed to this story.