Camp Fire: CCS has plan to play football if smoke doesn’t clear

The Central Coast Section has a contingency plan to hold its playoff football games this weekend if the Air Quality Index numbers in the Bay Area do not improve.

Commissioner Duane Morgan, in a memo Wednesday to member schools, announced that the section will hold triple-headers at five sites in the Southern end of the section Saturday if rescheduled games cannot be played.

Here would be Saturday’s fall-back schedule:

Salinas High: Los Gatos vs. Palo Alto, 1 p.m.; Milpitas vs. Menlo-Atherton, 4 p.m. Piedmont Hills vs. Wilcox, 7 p.m.

Alisal High: St. Ignatius vs. Sacred Heart Prep, 1 p.m.; Live Oak vs. Sacred Heart Cathedral, 4 p.m.; Del Mar vs. The King’s Academy, 7 p.m.

Alvarez High: Oak Grove vs. Archbishop Mitty, 1 p.m.; Aragon vs. St. Francis, 4 p.m.; Serra vs. Leland, 7 p.m.

Watsonville High: Santa Clara vs. Overfelt, 1 p.m.; Mountain View vs. Burlingame, 4 p.m.; Aptos vs. Terra Nova, 7 p.m.

Pacific Grove High: Soledad vs. Independence, 1 p.m.; Carlmont vs. Willow Glen, 4 p.m.; Christopher vs. Valley Christian, 7 p.m.

“Since the Salinas-Monterey-Watsonville areas have been consistently low in the AQI numbers we have set up 5 sites to play triple headers at each site,” Morgan wrote in the memo. “Upon the graciousness of Salinas HS, Alvarez HS, Alisal HS, Pacific Grove HS and Watsonville HS, they have opened their doors to host games at their sites.

“This has been a very stressful time for you and your athletes and we all recognize and appreciate the cooperation that has been exhibited by all of you. It is the expectation that this cooperation will continue and please do not allow any type of gamesmanship to interfere with this laid out plan. People wanting to change this or that, thinking that one team is getting an advantage over another team will not be entertained — we are way beyond that point.

“Again these are all contingent and hopefully we can get these games in as scheduled, but to help you plan for travel, alerting your community, etc. I wanted to get his in your hands.”

Morgan’s announcement came on a day in which the neighboring North Coast Section, in a 5-2 vote by its executive committee, decided that it will determine its Northern California regional participants by coin flip if it cannot complete its playoffs and there was no head-to-head game this season between the teams involved.

The California Interscholastic Federation has pushed back its regional and state games by a week to accommodate sections that rescheduled games last weekend. The NorCal regionals will now be played Dec. 7-8 and the state championships will be held Dec. 14-15.

The CCS also announced that it will move its cross country championship to Toro Park in Salinas on Sunday — the site is unavailable Saturday — if the AQI numbers Friday morning do not indicate that the air will be healthy enough Saturday at Crystal Springs in Belmont.

“We will make that decision on Friday morning,” Morgan wrote.