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Officials: Football Coach Not Fired

DANVILLE — A community has been buzzing for days that the head high school football coach and his staff were fired, but the school district insists, that&...

DANVILLE -- A community has been buzzing for days that the head high school football coach and his staff were fired, but the school district insists, that's not the case.

Social media is buzzing with claims Danville's football coaching staff was fired.

Administrators at Danville Area School District tell Newswatch 16 that is just a rumor.

Wednesday night at the end of Newswatch 16's sportscast, Jim Coles mentioned that Danville's football coaching staff would not be back this year.

We want to correct that. District officials tell us they were not let go but this all ramped up during the day with a lot of talk in Danville that the coaches were gone.

High school football season is over so it's quiet on the Danville Area High School football field. Off the field is a different story.

"It's the buzz around town," said Josh Swartz. "Any customer that comes in, if they know anything about what's going on, that's what they're talking about."

Swartz is referring to rumors that Danville's football coaching staff including head coach Jim Keiser, were fired during Tuesday night's school board meeting. Hundreds of people posted about it on Facebook and rumors spread.

"It's like that game of telephone. It starts on one end as one thing and by the time it gets to the other end, it's completely different," Swartz said.

"Social media, you know? Some stuff is true, some stuff you really don't know. Really, we've got to wait and see really what's going to happen," Scott Oberdorf said.

Newswatch 16 spoke to both the Danville Area School Board president and high school principal. Both tell us no one was fired and no one quit. No action was taken on the football position and no football coaching positions are posted.

Due to all of the confusion, not a lot of people wanted to go on camera. Everyone Newswatch 16 talked with spoke very highly of the coach.

"I know Coach Keiser's been there a while, he's been successful," Swartz said.

"He's directed Danville to playoffs almost every year. One year we had an off year. The following year he turned the team around, I think we had a 1-9 team and I think we went 8-3," Oberdorf added.

Officials with the Danville Area School District tell Newswatch 16 they will put out a statement Friday addressing the issue.

It is expected to be discussed at the next school board meeting, which is scheduled for February 13.

We reached out to Coach Keiser but haven't heard back.

Newswatch 16 apologizes for any confusion our sports report may have added to this.

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