CHSAA cautiously optimistic for fall
With approximately a month left before high school sports are set to return to Colorado, other states are beginning to announce their plans for the fall.
The Utah High School Activities Association voted unanimously Thursday to resume fall sports as planned, while New Mexico announced it will push back fall sports like football and soccer to a start date in February. Earlier in the day, Dallas Independent School District Superintendent Michael Hinojosa told MSNBC he had major doubts about contact sports, specifically football, being played this fall as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to sweep across the nation.
Colorado remains tight-lipped about its plans, although CHSAA commissioner Rhonda BlanfordGreen expressed cautious optimism about the fall season in the wake of Thursday’s news.
“The Colorado High School Activities Association is involved in discussions with 50 other state associations to determine directions that we potentially will go,” she said. “But our final decisions will be based on our state, public and health guidelines.”
CHSAA has submitted resumption plans based on state and local guidelines for review ahead of the 2020-21 school year, but Blanford-Green said they will not know whether fall sports can proceed until they hear back from the state.
“Every state is in a different level of participation and coachathlete contact based upon their governor’s orders,” she said. “And we are in a more fluid situation to resume in fall based upon the current guidelines of our state.”
Blanford-Green’s optimism was echoed by Jefferson County Executive Director of Athletics Jim Thyfault.
He is still hoping for the best and doesn’t think the decisions of other states will have much impact on what will happen in Colorado. He also stressed that patience is needed.
“If we had to make a decision today, we might not like the decision — we might not like the answer,” he said. “So let’s let time take its course and let’s get ourselves to the first of August and kind of see where we’re at, and we might be in a little better position to make solid decisions then.”
Thyfault said as much as he wants to see a return to sports, safety for students in his district must come first.
“We all have to be somewhat concerned due to the environment that we’re in,” he said. “We all kind of have to take a step back, make sure we’re dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s so to speak and making sure we’re making safe decisions for our kids.”
Thyfault said there will be several logistical challenges for any return. Moving football to the spring, for example, could also affect multi-sport athletes who participate in traditional spring sports. As of now, Jeffco Schools is still in the return-to-workouts phase of its reopening plan, and Thyfault said it will continue to move forward with the assumption that sports will return in the fall. That’s the same approach Ponderosa High School football head coach Jaron Cohen is using as he gets his players ready for a season that might not happen.
“Obviously, it’s going to be a wait-and-see approach,” he said.
Cohen has his players organized in groups of 25 that rotate through strength-and-conditioning exercises three days a week. A new cohort of players arrives every half hour with temperature checks, then goes to different stations where a coach oversees agility, conditioning, strength, or other specific types of training. Players can’t change groups or share equipment.
“It’s different, but we’re doing what we can,” Cohen said.
Like Thyfault, Cohen is also hopeful high school football can be played this year, whether in the fall or the spring. And the devotion from his players has shown him just how much they want to as well.
“All 22 sports have value and should be played,” he said. “And if that means schools are in nontraditional seasons, that would be so much better than the alternative.”