C-Oaks Basketball - 21-1 or 5-17?

Cosumnes Oaks' athletic director Bill Kapp and others from the Elk Grove school met this morning with officials of the State CIF office pleading their case that the Wolfpack basketball squad should not be forced to forfeit 16 wins this season for playing an ineligible player.

The decision may not be reached for several days on the appeal by Kapp and crew but more facts of this story have begun to surface.

One of the Wolfpack players transferred to Cosumnes Oaks for this basketball season after playing for a high school in the Stockton area a year ago. Apparently, this player came as a result of a connection with the father of another player on the CO team who was his AAU basketball coach.

Typically, this kind of school transfer will raise the eyebrows of Section and school district officials (see Sheldon basketball) but in this case there were some inaccuracies on the transfer paperwork turned into the school, according to sources. Those inaccuracies were discovered by Kapp and he reported that to Elk Grove Unified officials who then consulted with the Sac-Joaquin Section office.

The decision was that the player should be ineligible immediately and because he had played in 16 games this season for a team that was, at the time 18-1, the school should forfeit those wins. There would be no further sanctions on the Cosumnes Oaks program.

However, the school is claiming they discovered the inaccuracies with the paperwork and the parents of the player should bare the fault, which is a monetary fine. Kapp claims the school shouldn't be brought to blame for the incident.

If Kapp's appeal works, the Wolfpack would be 21-1 this season, one of the best records of any area basketball team. Until then, Cosumnes Oaks is 5-17 and must win out the rest of the way in order to make the playoffs.

We'll let you know how this one turns out.