High school football pushes to play in fall
High school football is ready to call an audible to fashion some sort of season this fall.
B.C. Secondary Schools Football Association president Travis Bell says his group has submitted a return-to-play plan to B.C. School Sports (BCSS) that has a “whole bunch of ideas,” and they’ll proceed with “whatever is deemed safe and appropriate.”
They’re waiting to hear back from BCSS and to speak with the various school districts to see about moving forward in these coronavirus times.
High school football folks are talking about limited travel during their season, with games only against teams from your particular region.
They’re talking about no huddles and about doing away with sideline space limitations so players can spread out. They’re talking about limiting fans in the stands.
Speak to enough high school football people and you’ll hear about newfangled helmets that feature face masks supposedly designed to work like surgical masks. Bell was quick to say that gear hasn’t been mandated by his group right now, but admitted they’re willing to look at whatever options are necessary.
There’s a lot to work through. Playing isn’t a certainty. Bell admits that. They’re going to make that push, though.
“We’re trusting that Dr. Bonnie Henry and her team are a lot smarter than the rest of us. We’re going to give them ideas and we’re willing to work with whatever they tell us,” said Bell, who is best known on these pages for his stint coaching Abbotsford’s W.J. Mouat Hawks.
“I think the kids are more positive than the adults right now. Hopefully this fall looks a lot more normal and we’re going to keep giving them hope where we can. At the same time, we’re not going to bury our heads in the sand.
“We need to be realistic. We’re talking about a second (COVID -19) wave in the fall. What impact does that have? When does it come? We’re just going to do everything we can to be ready for whatever happens.”
High school football doesn’t currently have a schedule posted. They have traditionally started in early September, with the opening games at the end of the first week of school.
Longtime New Westminster Hyacks coach Farhan Lalji hopes that football people can start meeting with school districts soon, so that they aren’t trying to get things signed off on in the midst of what promises to be a frantic late August and early September.
High school football mandates at least two weeks of practice before the first game, Lalji says, for safety reasons.
The baseline parameters for a return to action were created by viaSport, the government’s delivery agency for sport.
We’re currently in viaSport’s second phase that runs until September. There’s no specific date, which is to be expected, considering how fluid things have been throughout the pandemic. The third phase doesn’t currently have a firm start date, either.
The second phase says that contact sports shouldn’t occur, but can look for non-contact training alternatives. The third phase permits what’s described as “smallgroup contact skills.”
The Canada West conference, which features the UBC Thunderbirds, cancelled its football season, along with other fall university sports, last week.
As for whether this high school season being cancelled would affect university scholarship opportunities for players, B.C. Secondary Schools Football Association board member Kurt Thornton said Canadian university coaches “work hard to cultivate relationships with high school coaches and they track players as young as Grade 9 up through their senior season.”