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Beaver Local fills schedule after Minerva COVID pause

CALCUTTA — COVID-19 is back for the 2022 football season.

The Minerva at Beaver Local game scheduled for Friday was canceled Tuesday morning due to cases on the Minerva team and staff.

After dealing with COVID cancellations the last two seasons, not many expected to be going through it again for a third year.

“None of us did,” Beaver Local athletic director Josh Sigler said. “But I didn’t think we’d see two schools go on teachers’ strikes (Columbus and maybe Niles) either.”

Before the Beavers left football practice Tuesday afternoon, they learned they will be hosting Columbus Linden-McKinley at 7 p.m. Friday. Although Sigler said that could change if the Panthers have transportation problems.

Linden-McKinley opened the season with a 45-0 win over Columbus West . Last week’s game was canceled due to a teachers’ strike.

The Panthers are tied for fourth in the Region 11 computer ratings. Their home game against Millersport scheduled for Thursday was canceled.

Beaver Local is 0-2 on the season and was looking forward to playing Minerva, which has gone 3-69 since 2015.

Sigler said he got a call from Minerva on Tuesday morning.

“Coach (Mike) McKenzie and I sat down for more than an hour looking for teams and tried to contact schools,” Sigler said. “Most of the time coaches know who to contact.”

They searched for schools looking for games and contacted some of them.

He said they contacted Niles, which was interested, but the Red Dragons could not quarantine a game due to a looming teachers’ strike.

Sigler said McKenzie sent his players a text about the Minerva game getting canceled and they were trying to find a new opponent.

The Beavers went to practice preparing for a game like usual, although they didn’t know if they had one.

Linden-McKinley agreed to play Friday and the Beavers were told before practice had ended.

Sigler said Cleveland Independence contacted them about playing Friday after the arrangements with Linden-McKinley were made.

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