On November 4, the Illinois High School Association (IHSA) successfully petitioned St. Clair County’s 20th Judicial Court to absolve a temporary restraining order that the court had granted to East St. Louis Senior High School. The IHSA ruled on October 26 that the East St. Louis Senior High School football team would forfeit 10 victories from its 2009 season, five victories from the 2010 season and be removed from the 2010 IHSA Football Playoffs after the team was found to have used an ineligible player in those contests. The court granted East St. Louis Senior High School a temporary restraining order on October 28 on the basis that the school be given additional time to review the information from the investigation. After allowing additional due process, the IHSA once again determined on November 3 that the school had used an ineligible player and had inadequate policies in place to prevent the infraction. Earlier today, the Association presented its findings to Judge Richard Aguirre and asked that the temporary restraining order be absolved.
The absolution of the temporary restraining order by Judge Aguirre results in the East St. Louis Senior High School football team forfeiting the 15 aforementioned contests and being removed from the 2010 IHSA Football Playoff field. Belleville West High School, who was defeated by East St. Louis Senior High School in the first round of the playoffs, will return to the playoff field and face Belleville East this weekend in a second round contest. No seeds will be changed as a result of the switch.
“This is an important ruling that reinforces our ability to govern our member schools,” said IHSA Executive Director Marty Hickman. “It is the obligation of each member school to abide by those rules and to be accountable for the repercussions that accompany failure to comply. This is an unfortunate incident, but it does not change East St. Louis Senior High School’s status or standing as an IHSA member school. It is our goal to now work with the school’s administration to improve the policies and procedures that allowed these violations to occur, in the hopes that this situation never repeats itself."