ORONO – Citing the extensive damage and inconvenience caused by Hurricane Isabel, the College of William & Mary announced Tuesday it has canceled Saturday’s Atlantic 10 football game against the University of Maine.

The school, located in Williamsburg, Va., one of the areas hit hard by Isabel, remains closed through Sunday because of concerns about the safety of the campus and the ability to provide proper services.

“Regrettably, to host a football game or accommodate a hastily arranged effort to transport our football team to an off-campus location is not a priority of equal urgency,” William & Mary President Tim Sullivan said in a statement.

While the UMaine athletic department is sensitive to those concerns, UMaine athletic director Patrick Nero questioned the school’s decision to cancel the game without looking at other options.

“While being sympathetic and understanding to the situation at William & Mary, this decision to cancel seems inconsistent with other teams on the William & Mary campus,” said Nero, who explained the school not only flew its football team to Boston last Thursday for its Saturday game with Northeastern in Boston, but has been rescheduling games in other sports to other sites this week.

Further, Nero said the Tribe football team has been practicing this week and that its home field, Zable Stadium, has electrical power and was not damaged by the hurricane.

The Atlantic 10 had contacted UMaine Monday and asked first if it would consider playing Sunday and then whether it would play in Richmond, an hour away.

UMaine agreed, but William & Mary wasn’t willing to bargain. When W&M didn’t respond, Nero went out of his way to offer other alternatives.

“The University of Maine has made every effort to assist William & Mary with options for playing this game including alternate dates, an alternate site in the state of Virginia [University of Richmond] that was available, as well as offering to pick up all costs for William & Mary to travel to Orono to play the game here this Saturday and donating all game proceeds to a fund for hurricane relief,” Nero said.

“William & Mary has declined all of these offers,” he added.

Nero said Atlantic 10 Commissioner Linda Bruno spearheaded efforts to play the game, only to have William & Mary cancel it outright.

“The most frustrating thing for us right now is, we can’t get an explanation from [W&M] why they have allowed athletic competitions since the storm came last Thursday, including an away football game,” Nero said.

UMaine football coach Jack Cosgrove was summoned from the practice field Tuesday afternoon and informed about the cancellation. He told his coaches, then the players, and immediately sent them home.

“There were concerns about William & Mary hosting this game, but I didn’t think it would come to this,” said a disappointed Cosgrove.

“What else could you have done to make this game happen?” he said of the efforts by UMaine and the A-10 to move the game. “It’s very damaging to our team.”

Nero said there is no chance Saturday’s game will be played. However, A-10 athletic directors will conduct a conference call Thursday morning to determine whether to classify the action by William & Mary as a forfeit or just as a canceled game with no ramifications.

“The game has been canceled on us so, in our eyes, the game has been forfeited by William & Mary, ” Nero said.

For Cosgrove and the Bears, it’s a double-edged sword in terms of how the situation will be reflected if UMaine winds up under consideration for a spot in the postseason.

“One less game or a forfeit win are both negatives,” said Cosgrove, who worried about his team’s plight in 2001 when it had a non-conference game canceled because of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. “It looks bad.”

Cosgrove quietly questioned the motives for William & Mary (1-2, 0-1 Atlantic 10) wanting to cancel the game. The Tribe has struggled, playing three straight road games and losing 48-14 to Northeastern Saturday.

“Obviously, we haven’t had a home game in a month. We’d love to play the game,” Tribe athletic director Terry Driscoll made to the Daily Press of Newport News (Va.).

“This latest wrinkle just got to the point where we just don’t feel that we’re able to pick up and take our team for the fourth week in a row someplace and provide the type of preparation and support we need to conduct ourselves the way we want to conduct ourselves,” Driscoll said.

Driscoll explained because the Division I-AA football playoffs begin the week after the regular season ends, there is no chance to reschedule the contest at the end of the season.