KANSAS CITY, MO. — The former Olathe North star quarterback who has been ruled ineligible after transferring to Iowa picked up some big-time support Thursday on Twitter.
Arland Bruce IV, whose father Arland Bruce III starred for more than a decade in the Canadian Football League, transferred amid uncertainty over whether the Eagles would play in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
But the Iowa High School Athletic Association ruled Bruce, who led Olathe North to the Kansas Class 6A state championship game last season, ineligible the morning of Ankeny’s first game.
Bruce appealed the decision, but the governing body refused to budge on the grounds that his brothers didn’t move along with Bruce and his mom from Kansas to Iowa, according to the Des Moines Register.
Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes, the former NFL MVP and reigning Super Bowl MVP, thinks it’s a farce.
“Let my man @abruceiv play!,” Mahomes wrote Thursday on Twitter. “Kid wants to play his senior year of football why stop him?!? @IHSAA”
Let my man @abruceiv play! Kid wants to play his senior year of football why stop him?!? @IHSAA https://t.co/CsjmKidZHW
— Patrick Mahomes II (@PatrickMahomes) September 18, 2020
Bruce, who has verbally committed to Iowa, won the Thomas A. Simone Award as the top high school football player in the Kansas City area last year. His father won the 1995 Simone Award, making them the only father-son duo to win the honor.
