AIA winter athletics put on hold until January
Competition will begin first week of 2021
All Yuma area high schools’ winter sports will be put on hold due to the Arizona Interscholastic Association’s decision to delay the start of the season.
On Thursday, the AIA Executive Board members voted to postpone the start of the winter sports season due to the rising number of COVID-19 cases in the state.
The earliest beginning date is Jan. 5, 2021. The last permissible day of competition for winter sports will be Friday, Feb. 19, 2021, which includes any play-in competitions, according to the AIA’s press release.
“We feel that the students are safer within the school environment than not to be in school at all,” said AIA Executive Director David Hines in the release. “Delaying the start of the season will give our coaches and administrators time to implement safety protocols and put sports modifications in place. Just like getting fall sports off the ground, doing things the right way will allow for our sports to continue.”
A minimum of 14 days of practice before any competition can begin is required for each school.
According to the press release, the start of the competition season will depend on the following measures:
If a student-athlete participates with a nonschool team/group, that student-athlete is excluded from practice and competition with the school team for 14 days since the last
practice or competition of the non-school team/ group.
All winter sports modifications are required.
No fans will be permitted until metrics are appropriate. AIA staff will be communicating with schools and districts statewide to evaluate readiness on a regular basis.
No scrimmages, invitational tournaments or region tournaments will be allowed.
No out-of-state competitions will be allowed.
The AIA’s decision to move in this direction isn’t a surprise to Cibola’s athletic director Brett Pavey.
“I think everyone was expecting them to postpone the start because the Nov.
30 start date wasn’t realis
tic with things being the way they are,” Pavey said. “I thought they’d look at a later date because Jan. 5 is kind of early in my opinion.”
Fourteen days of practice is mandatory before games begin, which means practices will need to start at the latest Dec. 22.
The obvious difficulty is getting players and coaches to attend/schedule practices during the holiday season.
“It puts teams in a tough spot trying to practice over Christmas vacation when community numbers are still going to be pretty high,” Pavey said.
Pavey also noted that there will be flexibility for each district when games will begin and it won’t be surprising if teams have
staggered starting dates.
Schedules were originally set in place for the winter season, but with the changes, each team will get new schedules.
Pavey said the conference schedulers will need to have everything submitted by Dec. 11.
According to the AIA press release, conference leaders will meet at their earliest convenience to develop qualification procedures and minimum number of contests needed for postseason consideration.
Also, the first date of spring sports practice has been delayed one week from Feb. 8, 2021 to Feb. 15, 2021. As of now, AIA spring sports championships remain as scheduled per the AIA’s calendar.