Lightning Postpones Hearts at Mascoutah to Saturday Afternoon; Other Area Schedule Changes (UPDATE AS OF 10:15AM SATURDAY)

Effingham's first-ever varsity football game at Mascoutah will be a 2-part affair, after lightning caused a delay and eventual postponement of action to 4:30pm Saturday afternoon.

There was 1:36 left in the 1st quarter when officials spotted lightning and cleared the stands per IHSA rules. Those rules also state that play can't resume until 30 minutes after the last lightning strike. After a delay of more than an hour, officials postponed the game to Saturday, as there seemed to be no end to constant lightning around the area.

Mother Nature's light show was seemingly unending Friday night around a good portion of the region

Mascoutah had taken an early 7-0 lead over the Hearts, with a 2-yard touchdown run by Misikei Thomson in the Indians first drive of the game. That drive also included the Hearts first look at Mascoutah's ability to throw the ball, capped off by a 20-yard pass by Quarterback Tim Parks to wide receiver Barry Richardson.

The Hearts had possession of the ball when play was delayed, and will resume their drive when the game restarts Saturday afternoon.

We'll carry the game live on Your Home for the Hearts, 979XFM, and again take our portable FM transmitter. If you're headed to Mascoutah to watch the game, bring along a radio and tune it to 97.9 to hear Greg and Dustin's call of the game. We'll also continue to video the game, and have it online over the weekend.

Also, The JV game for Effingham has been canceled. The Freshman game will be played at Effingham at 10am Saturday morning, and Effingham's JFL games at Mt. Vernon have been postponed to October 4, due to Mt. Vernon's home game against Charleston being postponed to Saturday due to the storms.

Many other games around our area were postponed to Saturday due to the weather, listed below:

Cumberland at Arcola at 10 am

Mattoon at Bethalto Civic Memorial at 2 pm

Charleston at Mount Vernon at 3:30 pm

Flora at Robinson at 1:30 pm

Bridgeport Red Hill at Olney East Richland at 2 pm

Casey-Westfield at Newton at 7 pm

Carlinville at Vandalia at 10 am

Mount Zion at Jerseyville at 6 pm

Carlyle at Freeburg at 12 noon

Eureka at Mahomet-Seymour at 7pm

Piasa Southwestern at Greenville at 4pm

Roxana at Pana at 6:30pm

Bartonville Limestone at Taylorville at 5pm

Martinsville at ALAH at 1pm

Mt. Olive at Sullivan Okaw Valley at 6pm

Oblong at Sangamon Valley at 6pm

Salem at Highland at 11am

Shelbyville at Rantoul at 2pm

Litchfield at Gillespie at 7pm

Staunton at Hillsboro at noon

A few games in our area were completed Friday. Here are those scores:

Marshall 43, Albion (Edwards County) 0

Lawrenceville 46, Paris 0

Oakland Tri-County 33, Decatur LSA 3

Centralia 28, Wood River-East Alton 0