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It would have been the 40th annual, but now it will be the first one missed in four decades.

Due to the circumstances of 2020 – namely the COVID-19 pandemic – the 2020 Keg Bowl has been cancelled, Blue Hawk Gridiron Club president Doug Willhite announced earlier this week. One of the longest running sports events in Sanders County history, the Keg Bowl, a friendly game of flag football played every year (on the Saturday between Christmas and New Year’s Day) since 1980, will sadly not be played this Saturday.

“It would have been the 40th annual and we were really looking forward to it,” Willhite said. “But 80% of the people who play in it are generally from out of town and we don’t want that.

“We want to do the right thing and protect people,” he added, “and prevent the spread of a killer virus.”

Willhite said that plans are being made to play the 40th annual Keg Bowl in 2021, and hopes that all those crazy guys that make the game so much fun make their way back to it.

“We will be back,” he promised. “The Keg Bowl is an institution that needs to be preserved.”

And we could all again use the diversion of a fun day of watching a bunch of old guys wallowing around in the snow chasing a slippery pigskin with friends. It beats worrying about staying away from everyone else all the time and wearing a mask, doesn’t it?