Moving forward, cautiously
Full practices begin with health, safety at forefront
The fall athletes at Westhill learned a valuable lesson from their friends who lost postseasons last winter and entire seasons in the spring: Do whatever it takes to ensure you have a season.
It is something that resonates with seniors most of all.
At Westhill Monday, the
girls volleyball team was in the gymnasium for the first time all season after spending the last three weeks practicing outside on the grass field next to the tennis courts to follow guidelines set by the DPH.
Players were wearing masks as they played, a mandate from the CIAC to attempt to keep the sport at moderate risk. Balls were being wiped down and sanitized after being used in drills. Players could not have been happier.
“We are so excited to be back in the gym. It is very different, but it is still so good,” senior captain Vana Servos said. “Outside there is sun, there is wind, the land is not even but it just makes us better. I had a couple friends of mine that were not able to play in the CIAC (tournament) for hockey and I don’t want that to be us. I don’t want our team to not be able to play. We take everything very seriously because we know it is a serious matter.”
It’s been a long road to get to this point. No high school contests have been played since March 9 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The CIAC canceled the remainder of its winter postseason tournaments the next day. Then the state’s governing high school body canceled its entire spring season in early May.
In the age of the coronavirus, conditioning in cohorts was an absolute necessity. Fall sports teams have been practicing in cohorts of the same 10 people
since July 6, save for a week in August when the CIAC paused all conditioning to review recommendations from the state Department of Health.
Fall sports teams were able to begin non-skill development on Aug. 29 in those same cohorts. The move to full practices on Monday went from low to moderate risk.
All of the fall sports — except football, which had its 11 on 11 contact season canceled on Sept. 4 — can begin having scrimmages this Saturday, Sept. 26, followed by the start of the regular season no earlier than on Oct. 1. Fall sports include boys and girls cross country, boys and girls soccer, field hockey, girls swimming and girls volleyball.
Westhill volleyball coach Marianna Linnehan said the resilience of the athletes made the time outdoors a little easier.
“They just want to play. Especially my seniors, they just want to play,” Linnehan said. “They just want to be in the gym playing. They don’t care if they have masks on or if they have to wear gloves. They just want to play. Now we are getting to play 6-on-6 which is great. When we had cohorts of 10, we can’t go 5-on-5 because it’s not a full court. It was very difficult.”
Outside, boys soccer was on the front field scrimmaging 11-on-11 while field hockey was outside practicing in J. Walter Kennedy Stadium.
Field hockey practice looked normal other than players wearing masks under their chins while playing, then pulling them over their noses and mouths during breaks.
“From my perspective it has been about working with our coaches to make sure they understand the protocols and what we are trying to do,” Westhill Athletic Director Dick Cerone said. “Volleyball was the last domino to fall with concerns over them being indoors, but we got the OK today and the kids are so happy. The kids are trying to do the right thing around school and the athletes have been great. They saw their friends in the spring go through what they went through, getting nothing, and they don’t want to have that happen to them.”
New Canaan girls soccer coach Rich Hickson said that although full-team, full-contact practices have started, COVID safety protocols remain front and center, a fact he reinforced with his team at the end of Monday’s session at the Saxe School fields.
“We all need to do our best to manage this,” Hickson said while emphasizing the use of masks, hand sanitizer, and social distancing protocols to the Rams.
When arriving at practices each day, the players answer questions from the CIAC’s monitoring form, with Hickson noting their responses.
“I do it old school - by pen and paper,” Hickson said. “As they come in, I ask them a multitude of screening questions, they answer yes or no, and that will happen every day at practice.
Hickson also stressed the use of masks as well, as players arrive for and leave from practices while wearing masks.
“This is our first day when we’re combining upperclassmen and underclassmen and the talent’s really impressive,” senior tri-captain McKenna Harden said. “So I’m really excited for the season because I think we’ll do really well.”
Opening day has been a long time coming, but Harden said the players have been working out in different areas through the summer and fall.
“Over the summer, we did a couple of captains practices and then we started with preseason in midAugust,” Harden said. “We did a strength and conditioning clinic which was optional, but a lot of people did it, which was really good.”
Players also participated in a summer camp run by the New Canaan Booster Club, running through footwork and speed drills to get in shape.
Hickson said the team is holding tryouts this week, but there are time constraints. In past years, morning and afternoon sessions of tryouts would’ve been held before school started.
The coach said the players have remained positive.
“Everybody seems to be really happy to be out here and the morale is good,” Hickson said. “They just seem to be happy to be out there, playing and being involved with their friends and teammates. We’re close to (the first game), but it’s still one day at a time.”
In Darien, athletic trainer Katie Bryant set up a Google doc to make it easier for coaches to monitor their athletes’ health each day.
Darien boys soccer coach Jon Bradley said he felt it was important to keep student-athletes involved and with that in mind, the program is keeping everyone this season.
“As a coaching staff, we made the decision not to cut players this year and we explained the many reasons to the boys,” Bradley said. “The biggest (reason) being that we believe players having a home and an activity after school is so important.”
Despite the reduced schedule and the changes in the way things are done this season, Bradley’s players are happy to be with the soccer team.
“My message is clear: We are lucky,” Bradley said. “We are playing and having fun and doing what we enjoy. There are many people in worse positions than us.”
Darien boys cross country coach Tyson Kaczmarek said his runners have been great given the circumstances.
“We are wearing masks anytime we are not engaged in physical activity,” Kaczmarek said. “We put a lot of thought into our cohorts. With the help of the captains we tried to group people by ability. We ran the risk of having to quarantine an entire cohort, but it looks like it has paid off.
“Being able to train with people of your ability, even if it is one other person, was very important to us.”