The Peninsula High football team, which started the year with 27 players and has been ravaged by injuries, cancelled the remainder of its season.

“We no longer believe that we can safely field a varsity team without putting the health of our remaining student-athletes in jeopardy,” Peninsula Principal Mitzi Cress said in a press release. “Site administrators have spent the last several days conferring with our coaching staff, trainers and CIF, and have in turn reached out to our counterparts in the Bay League. To varying degrees, they are also experiencing reduced numbers in their football programs. As a result, they are understanding and supportive of the position we are in.”

Peninsula, which did not field a freshman team this year, is 2-5 on the season with three games left that will not be played.

“Peninsula High has a proud tradition of successful football teams, including players who have gone on to star in the NFL,” Cress said. “While this decision is part of a much larger national conversation about the sport of football, we continue to fully support the future of our football program under the direction of Coach Mike Christensen, who has led numerous successful programs in Southern California and for the last 15 years has served as a member of the National High School Committee, serving the American Football Coaches’ Association.”

Peninsula is coming off a 54-13 loss to Mira Costa, and was about to play another powerful team in Redondo on Friday night.

“Dark day for South Bay football,” former Inglewood and current Dominguez coach Jason Miller tweeted. “PVPHS was once the jewel program of South Bay Southern Section.”

Even before the season started, Christensen worried about numbers and knew his team needed to stay healthy. He said the team probably belonged in a league with smaller teams like the Santa Fe League with Mary Star after he saw his Panthers go 3-7 last year.

“If we get hit like we did last year, it’s going to be like last year. We were piece-mealing stuff together, re-teaching stuff every week because you have to move kids around (because of injuries), so we’ll see,” Christensen said.

Peninsula is in Division I in some sports and Division II or III in others, where kids are coming out in big numbers. But the football program has seen dwindling numbers in recent years.

Peninsula will not play Redondo, Inglewood and rival Palos Verdes — all three teams will be credited with forfeit wins.

Sports radio personality Petros Papadakis, the second-leading rusher in Peninsula High history who went on to play for USC, chimed in on the Twitter account @PetrosAndMoney.

“I never thought I’d see this at my alma mater,” Papadakis wrote.

Nearby Chadwick School switched from 11-man to 8-man football last year because of low turnout, but Palos Verdes has not seen a significant decrease in participants and is coming off a CIF Southern Section Western Division championship season.

“It makes me angry to know that (the rivalry game) is gone and the feeling of all of Palos Verdes gathered at a stadium is not going to happen this year,” PV junior Shane Irwin said. “I feel horrible for the Peninsula players who love football like I do and for the seniors on both Peninsula and PV.”

Peninsula was a powerhouse in the 1990s and into the turn of the century before the re-opening of PV High diluted the talent pool.

“It’s really unfortunate for the school and community,” El Segundo coach Steve Shevlin said. “There is always a combination of factors that take place when something like this happens. With such a rich history of football tradition, hopefully the school can bring back football soon. It’s just really, really tough to see happen.”