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Goat poop causes last-minute relocation of N.C. team’s senior night game

Of all the reasons games have been postponed or relocated in the past, one justification from a recent game in North Carolina has to be the strangest: A scheduled Senior Night football game was moved from one high school to another because of goat poop.

The perpetrator of the shifted site of a N.C. Senior Night football game: goats — Getty
The perpetrator of the shifted site of a N.C. Senior Night football game: goats — Getty

As reported by the Shelby Star of Cleveland County, N.C., a horde of goats somehow got access to the Lawndale (N.C.) Burns High football field the night before the team's scheduled Senior Night game against Rutherford (N.C.) Spindale Central High.

The 10-12 goats apparently walked around the playing surface (as goats are wont to do) occasionally grazing and, as one might expect, leaving a large mound of goat droppings near the fieldhouse. Evidently that mound of droppings caused enough concern for area officials that the game was quickly rescheduled for Crest (N.C.) High, where it went off as scheduled and fans witnessed a 49-6 Burns rout.

Burns players on the field which later was deemed unsafe because of goat droppings — Facebook
Burns players on the field which later was deemed unsafe because of goat droppings — Facebook

Keep in mind, the goats' presence in the facility and any subsequent damage to the playing surface they caused was not an issue. Rather, it was their dung, which raised concerns about how it would affect pre-existing dangerous E. coli levels across the area that forced the two teams to scramble to play at a neutral site.

To be fair, those E. coli concerns are no laughing matter. A strain of the bacteria has been linked with 98 cases of infection in the Cleveland County area, with more than 50 of the victims being children. At least one victim of infection has already died.

"The health department was here about 2:30 p.m. and told us we would need to do this," Burns High athletic director Eddy Taylor told the Star. "I got in touch with the Fallston Fire Department and they came and washed it [animal feces] down a drain."

While Burns officials have insisted that the goats were ushered into the facility by someone intending to play a prank on the school, at least one commenter on the Shelby Star's website claimed that the goats somehow got out of their pen at the nearby FFA facility of their own accord, eventually wandering into the football stadium.

Regardless of whether human or animal was responsible for the goats' presence on the Burns field, all expressed regret for the Burns senior football players, who had all planned Senior Night activities summarily canceled at the last moment.

"If I were a senior, I'd have hated for my senior game to [have to be] played at Crest," Burns soccer coach Clint Shuford, a former Burns varsity athlete himself, told the Star.

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