Air pollution prompts cancellation of Sonoma County sports events

Smoke from a wildfire in Butte County has altered sports scheduled to take place this weekend in Sonoma County and other Northern California areas.|

Smoke from a wildfire in Butte County has altered sports scheduled to take place this weekend in Sonoma County and other Northern California areas.

A full lineup of North Coast Section football playoff games scheduled for tonight and Saturday have been pushed to Monday. Section officials said they hoped the move to Monday would reduce “confusion and potential chaos” if the contests had to be rescheduled a second time.

The Monday playoff lineup includes American Canyon at Rancho Cotate, Ukiah at Campolindo, Encinal at Cardinal Newman, Cloverdale at Kelseyville, St. Helena at Salesian and Tomales at Branson.

The Middletown at Fort Bragg Div. 5 quarterfinal game will be played tonight at 7 p.m. as scheduled so long as air quality remains healthy, as will the Rincon Valley Christian at South Fork 8-person game.

Both the North Bay League Oak and Redwood divisions cross country finals have been rescheduled. The NBL-Redwood meet was originally scheduled to take place at Spring Lake today and NBL-Oak teams were slated to compete at Ukiah High School on Saturday.

“Our coaches will not be able to run today, it’s just too unsafe,” said NBL Commissioner Jan Smith Billing.

Schools across Sonoma County were canceled Friday because of the heavy smoke and ash in the air from the fires burning in Butte County.

“The air quality is horrible everywhere,” Smith Billing said.

Officials are tentatively planning to run the both league final meets at Spring Lake on Tuesday. Those negotiations were ongoing Friday morning.

League officials received a waiver to extend league competition past Saturday’s deadline. Prior to the fires, teams were required to complete all league competition by Nov. 10.

The league meets do not determine which runners advance to the North Coast Section finals which are scheduled to take place in Hayward on Nov. 17. The league meets determine individual and team league pennant winners.

The deadline for NCS entries remains Sunday night.

Rancho Cotate High School football coach Gehrig Hotaling said Thursday that he canceled his team’s practice, and that the team’s playoff game Friday night could be in jeopardy of being postponed. The CIF-North Coast Section Division 2 football quarterfinal between No. 1 seed Rancho Cotate and No. 10 American Canyon is scheduled for Friday at 7 p.m. at the Rancho Cotate campus in Rohnert Park.

The poor air quality is coming from heavy smoke from the Camp fire, which was burning more than 100 miles northeast of Sonoma County.

“We were forced to cancel practice today because of the smoke and bad air quality,” Hotaling said. “I have been on the phone for hours today trying to get information. The NCS will contact us sometime on Friday about it.”

Hotaling said he was not given a time by the NCS when a decision would be made or when he would be notified.

Other football playoff games in the area might also be in jeopardy of being postponed due to poor air quality. Other prep and college sports contests could be affected, including the North Bay League cross country championship at Spring Lake Friday afternoon.

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