Darren Kinnard
Section618.com

The IHSA Board of Directors has no expectation of starting even low risk winter sports prior to the new year. That’s the word from a virtual update session held by the Board.

In a statement, IHSA Executive Director Craig Anderson said the Board and IHSA staff will continue to monitor the Tier 3 Resurgence Mitigation currently put in place by Governor JB Pritzker. “When there is a timeline for the state to emerge from these restrictions, the Board is prepared to restart lower risk winter sports quickly,” said Anderson. The Board also hopes to reestablish contact days in January for sports yet to be played this school year, including winter sports that cannot begin. Those contact days will be based on mitigations from the Governor and the Illinois Department of Public Health.

According to Anderson, the IHSA “will remain agile in their preparation and willingness to adapt should a window present itself sooner.” That scenario is unlikely, considering the Governor announced Tuesday the current mitigations would go on for “the next few weeks.”

Anderson said the “Board reiterated that they remain committed to creating as much opportunity as possible for all sports that remain to be played this school year. They intend to evaluate the equity of each season as a potential resumption date in January begins to materialize.”

The Board is scheduled to meet again December 14.

Back in late October, a day after the Governor and the IDPH announced further restrictions on youth sports, the IHSA announced that it was going ahead with the basketball season as scheduled, despite the IDPH guidance. That left the decision of whether or not to play in the hands of the local school districts. Due to insurance and liability concerns, most of the 813 member schools had chosen not to play or were unlikely to play. November 17, Pritzker announced the Tier 3 mitigations that state remains under. Those mitigations shut down all indoor youth and adult recreational activities.