Thanks to a reshuffling of the Hoosier Hills Conference football schedule, Columbus East has been looking for a Week 3 opponent for the past two years.
That search finally came to an end this week when Pickerington (Ohio) Central called and offered to come to Columbus to play the Olympians. The game will be at 8 p.m. Sept. 6.
“Obviously, we’re in a situation where we wanted to find a good opponent, and we found one,” East coach Bob Gaddis said. “They’re a great opponent. We were happy that they could play over here, and secondly, that they could play on a Friday night. It should be a great game for our kids.”
Pickerington Central, a public suburban school on the southeast side of Columbus, Ohio, won the Division I (large school) state championship in 2017. Notable alumni include Dallas Cowboys defensive end Taco Charlton and Minnesota Vikings center Pat Elflein. Elflein and fellow Tigers alum Jacoby Boren were starting offensive linemen on Ohio State’s 2014 national championship team.
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The Tigers will open the season a week earlier against a team from Georgia in a nationally-televised showcase in Florida.
“Their coach told me about their team, and they’re a team that will be in the top five or 10 in Ohio in the big class,” Gaddis said.
East had an opening in its schedule after the HHC decided to go to a six-game conference schedule instead of the normal seven-game slate for 2019 and 2020. The Olympians will not play Jennings County this fall.
East traditionally has played Seymour in Week 3, but will play the Owls in Week 8 this year. So Gaddis and East athletics director Pete Huse had a hole in the schedule to fill for Week 3.
“We searched every state around us,” Gaddis said. “We followed all kind of leads for the last couple years. We thought we had another team out of St. Louis, and that fell through. We’ve been all over.”
The deal with Pickerington Central is for one year. The Olympians have filled the 2020 Week 3 date with a home game against Elkhart, which by then will be a consolidation of Elkhart Central and Elkhart Memorial High Schools.
“We couldn’t work out the two years, so we took the one year,” Gaddis said.
The HHC plans to go back to normal round-robin schedule starting in 2021.
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Columbus East’s revamped 2019 football schedule:
Aug. 23;at Whiteland;7 p.m.
Aug. 30;Columbus North;7 p.m.
Sept. 6;Pickerington (Ohio) Central;8 p.m.
Sept. 13;Jeffersonville;8 p.m.
Sept. 20;at New Albany;8 p.m.
Sept. 27;Floyd Central;8 p.m.
Oct. 4;at Bedford North Lawrence;7 p.m.
Oct. 11;at Seymour;7 p.m.
Oct. 18;Madison;7 p.m.
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