Court rules Bilas can keep playing football for Cardinal Mooney High School

Court rules Bilas can keep playing football for Cardinal Mooney High School

YOUNGSTOWN Nick Bilas, a junior offensive lineman, can continue to play football for Cardinal Mooney High School, a magistrate ruled this morning.

“The Ohio High School Athletic Association is enjoined from enforcing its decision denying interscholastic athletic eligibility to Nicholas Bilas,” ruled Magistrate Timothy G. Welsh of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court.

The OHSAA said Bilas, who transferred to Mooney from Poland Seminary High School this year, should be required to sit out one season because the association said the Bilas family moved from Poland to Youngstown for athletic purposes.

“The decision of the OHSAA is not supported by reliable, credible and substantial evidence,” the magistrate wrote as he granted the preliminary injunction the Bilas family had sought against the association.

Judge R. Scott Krichbaum of the same court had granted a temporary restraining order in late August, which enabled Bilas to continue playing football for Mooney, pending today’s decision on the preliminary injunction.