Darren Kinnard
Section618.com
For those hoping to have more guidance about the upcoming winter sports seasons from the IHSA after Monday’s regularly schedule Board of Directors meeting, you’ll have to wait at least a couple more weeks.
There will be a special meeting October 28 to hopefully finalize the winter sports plans.
Hopefully.
“We understand that student-athletes, coaches, parents, officials, and fans are anxious to learn more details about the plans for IHSA winter sports,” said IHSA Executive Director Craig Anderson. “We feel like we are making positive strides in our discussions with the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) to be allowed to conduct IHSA winter sports as scheduled. We believe we have a plan to do so safely and want to provide IDPH with ample time to review the winter sports plans, and supportive data, we have provided them. We expect to have a response from IDPH with final recommendations for winter sport plans, including any accommodations and postseason plans, by October 26. We will then reconvene our Board to officially vote and announce that information shortly thereafter.”
Practice for winter sports (boys/girls basketball, wrestling, cheerleading, dance, boys/girls bowling, boys swimming/diving, girls gymnastics) is scheduled to start November 16 with games starting November 30. According the Governor’s Youth Sports Restrictions implemented July 29, only boys/girls bowling, boys swimming/diving, and girls gymnastics would be eligible to have competitions because they are considered low risk sports. As a medium risk sport, basketball can practice but not have games. Wrestling, cheerleading, and dance are considered high risk sports, which means they can only have no contact practices and conditioning.
The metrics for how or when sports can move to the different levels of the Youth Sports Restrictions have never been made public. All indications are the IHSA does not even know the specifics. The current rise in the statewide positivity rate certainly does not bode well. Governor JB Pritzker was in Murphysboro Monday to announce that COVID Region 5 (Alexander, Edwards, Franklin, Gallatin, Hamilton, Hardin, Jackson, Jefferson, Johnson, Marion, Massac, Perry, Pope, Pulaski, Saline, Wabash, Wayne, White, Williamson, and Union counties) was being placed under additional mitigations due to a positivity rate of 9.1%. Among the restrictions that go into effect Thursday: no indoor service at bars and restaurants and limiting groups to 25 or less.
When asked about any possible changes for schools, Pritzker said the new mitigations do not apply to schools. “We’ve left it up to the local school districts and schools to put in their own mitigations to make sure they are keeping their students safe, their teachers safe, their parents safe, and all the people that work in the school safe,” Pritzker said. “What we don’t want to do is dictate to every school the same thing because, I think you all know, every school is a little bit different. It’s shaped a little bit different. It has a different number of kids, a different number of teacher, administrators, etc. They’re the ones that know best how to arrange their schools. They, together with parents and the school board, want to keep everybody safe, so we’ve given them the opportunity to do that.”
That is not the approach being used for high school athletics, so the IHSA is waiting to get the go ahead from the Governor and IDPH about moving forward with winter sports.
The Board did discuss a proposal from the September meeting to postpone wrestling. Action on that is expected in the special meeting October 28.
The major development that did come from Monday’s meeting was the Board’s approval of exemptions to the IHSA’s Independent Team By-law for spring and summer sports seasons. This is for the 2020-21 school year only.
Sports competing in the IHSA’s 2021 spring season (football, boys soccer, girls volleyball) will be granted the accommodation to participate simultaneously on school teams and non-school teams throughout the duration of their high school season (Feb. 15-May 1).
Sports competing in the IHSA’s 2021 summer season (baseball, softball, track & field, girls soccer, boys volleyball, lacrosse, boys tennis) will be granted the accommodation to participate simultaneously on school teams and non-school teams beginning on June 4. The summer season is slated to run from April 19 to June 26.
“Given the unique challenges of this school year, it remains important for our Board to be flexible and creative in seeking participation opportunities for students,” said IHSA Board Vice-President Robert Nolting, the Principal at Andrew High School in Tinley Park. “From my perspective, I am less worried about teams competing for conference or postseason titles this year. The goal is to get kids back being active to benefit their mental and physical well-being. These (independent team) by-laws aim to preserve competitive equity, but for this school year, we feel the right decision is to provide an accommodation that maximizes participation.”
“The Board determined it was prudent to make modifications to the independent team by-law for the sports that were displaced from their traditional high school season,” said Anderson. “They also came up with what we believe is a reasonable compromise for summer sports. The Board is hopeful that the high school teams will be given priority when conflicts occurs. We believe making a modification now will allow high school coaches and non-school team coaches to begin communication on how they can collaboratively resolve scheduling conflicts.”
Winter sports will have no accommodations to the by-law. It’s still a wait and see if there will even be a school season that would create a conflict.