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The Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association is sidelining Milwaukee Public Schools’ Pulaski and Bay View High School football teams over a paperwork problem.The district said it needed to file paperwork for Bay View and Pulaski high schools “to move between divisions before the 2024 season began.”The necessary paperwork was never filed, and now the two teams’ seasons are effectively over. “The two programs played in non-approved conferences and not their approved conferences,” Todd Clark, WIAA Communications Director, said. WIAA issued sanctions against both schools, making them ineligible for postseason play for the 2024-25 and 2025-26 seasons and requiring them to forfeit all games for the 2024 season.James Prince watched his son, Elijah Luckett, practice on Tuesday. “He actually got his start to play varsity two weeks ago,” Prince said.His son’s first varsity season will be cut short. “There’s got to be something wrong. I just couldn’t believe it. I almost cried,” said Luckett. “We earned the right to go to the playoffs, and then we get it taken away from us? That’s not right.”Both the Redcats and Rams are banned from the playoffs this year and next. It’s a gut punch for players like Luckett and Dayshon Milons-Mccall.”It was just like, in a way, like, why us? We’ve been doing so good,” Milons-Mccall said. After a losing season last year, Bay View was on a winning streak this year, with playoff dreams within reach. This Thursday’s game is a win or go home game for the team. Luckett and Milons-Mccall said the team is still playing and their focus is on winning. “If we have to win this game and knowing that we cannot play towards the next game, it’s going to break me down,” said Milons-Mccall. “I’m gonna just be like, well, we did all that for nothing.”Milons-Mccall’s dad, Anthony Milons, said his son, a junior, hoped to catch the eyes of college coaches. And football motivated his son to do well in school.”I just want to know, can he transfer?” Milons said. Prince expressed frustration that his son is bearing the brunt of the punishment for mistakes made by MPS administration.”MPS needs to do better and needs to do a better time and time again. They dropped the ball and the kids are the ones that suffer,” Prince said.Even Milwaukee city leaders are mad. A group of common council members said they do not have confidence in MPS athletics leadership.”Who’s to blame here for this?” WISN 12 News Reporter Kendall Keys asked Alderman Mark Chambers.”The commissioner, hands down. It’s not the kids, it’s not the schools, it’s not the principal or anything of that nature. It falls on the commissioner Bobby Kelsey,” said Chambers. “What it spells out to me is that this is a little bigger than just kids missing the playoffs and a clerical error.”The group of common council members, including Alderman Chambers, Jr., Alderman DiAndre Jackson, Alderman Robert Bauman and Alderwoman Sharlen Moore, issued a joint statement Tuesday. The statement reads in part, “This is unconscionable, as the hopes and dreams of players on those teams (and the coaching staffs) have been crushed because the top athletics official for the Milwaukee City Conference Bobbie Kelsey dropped the ball.”The entire joint statement can be read here.WISN tried calling Bobbie Kelsey at her district number for comment but could not reach her. In a statement to WISN 12 News, MPS communications staff said, “Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS) Office of Interscholastic Athletics & Academics did not file the necessary paperwork for the football teams from Bay View High School and Pulaski High School to move between divisions before the 2024 season began. This oversight led to a sanction from the Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association (WIAA), rendering both schools ineligible for postseason play in the 2024 and 2025 seasons, and requiring them to forfeit all games for the 2024 season.MPS takes this matter seriously and is investigating the circumstances that led to this serious oversight and will file an appeal.Our commitment to providing a fair and supportive environment for our student-athletes remains a priority.”