English/New Mission football won the Boston City League by beating O’Bryant on October 30, but the Eagles won’t be playing in the MIAA postseason. Boston Public Schools has admitted that nobody in the district submitted the O’Bryant game into the state’s scheduling system, a clerical slip that left the team one game short of tournament eligibility despite the on-field victory.
According to The Boston Globe, no one from BPS entered the O’Bryant game into ArbiterLive, the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association’s scheduling platform. Because that game was never logged, the MIAA treated it as a scrimmage rather than a counted contest, leaving English with a 4-2 record instead of the seven games required to qualify for the state tournament. The Eagles had been projected as the No. 10 seed in the Division 8 playoff bracket before the ruling.
A Clerical Error With Real Consequences
A BPS spokesperson called it a clerical error in submitting the schedule and said the district would appeal, adding that BPS would support its students and appeal the decision. The MIAA found English in violation of Rule 34.6, which the Globe reports requires teams to submit their schedules by a season-specific date — this year, September 18. BPS athletic director Avery Esdaile, who oversees 31 high schools, was unavailable for comment, per the same report.
The dispute is not the district’s first brush with postseason paperwork trouble. In 2022, Fenway High’s boys’ and girls’ basketball teams were barred from the postseason after BPS neglected to submit an MIAA form accounting for Dearborn players who had joined those teams. At the time, a BPS spokesperson said the district accepted responsibility and would hold responsible staff accountable, the station's report notes.
City Council Demands a Reversal
The Boston City Council unanimously adopted a resolution condemning the MIAA’s decision and urging officials to let English compete in the playoffs, with Ben Weber offering the measure. The resolution described the ruling as “draconian and unnecessarily punitive” and called on decision-makers to allow the team to take the field.
Scheduling fights of this kind are not unique to Boston. In 2024, more than a dozen western Massachusetts schools failed to submit full schedules by the MIAA deadline, and a Hampden County Superior Court judge upheld a temporary restraining order barring the MIAA from penalizing Minnechaug Regional High School over the lapse, according to The Boston Globe. That judge directed the MIAA to determine tournament eligibility based on correct and accurate game results rather than penalties tied to nonconforming submissions, and Minnechaug Regional along with several Monson High families ultimately won their court challenge against the association.
How the MIAA’s System Is Supposed to Work
The MIAA’s own guidance lays out a review window built for exactly this kind of mistake. Three days before the Schedule Commitment deadline, the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association publishes schedules based on the data already entered into Arbiter, giving member schools a chance to review and verify the information before it locks in. For Fall 2026, the association has said football data becomes final at noon on the day of seeding and bracket release, collected from a 4 a.m. report on the relevant working day; anything entered into Arbiter after that cutoff does not count, per MIAA guidelines.
Whether that review window gives BPS an opening in its appeal remains to be seen, as does the outcome of the district’s challenge. The Division 8 playoffs are already underway — the opener was set for 6 p.m. Thursday between eighth-seeded KIPP Academy and ninth-seeded West Boylston. English, meanwhile, was scheduled to visit Pentucket on Friday for a nonplayoff game, with its traditional Thanksgiving morning matchup against Boston Latin at Harvard Stadium still on the calendar.
