Could we just possibly be getting closer to high school sports taking the field for the 2020-21 season before the winter solstice?
When the State CIF Office voted to push the start of the upcoming fall season to mid-December practices and January games, the modified schedule was constructed as a plan if health conditions in the state warranted the late start.
It was devised as a plan provided all things were in place to proceed. It was not necessarily a guaranteed timetable.
As a result, the traditional three interscholastic seasons were combined into two seasons —fall (essentially traditional fall and most winter sports) and spring (traditional spring sports along with a few winter sports).
The traditional fall sports schedule was set to kick off with the opening week of football games last Friday.
With the announcement on Aug. 19 that 19 San Diego County schools had received waivers from the state’s closure mandate to reopen for in-person classes for the fall term, there could be a glimmer of hope that prep sports could be back on the playing field in some form before Christmas, at least at some schools.
The feeling among many coaches is that high school sports depend on in-school attendance. No fannies in classroom seats equates to no cleats on the playing field.
Among the 19 schools granted waivers by the county to reopen, nine field high school sports teams: Calvary Christian Academy, Francis Parker School, La Jolla Country Day School, Ocean View Christian Academy, El Cajon Christian High School, Santa Fe Christian School, The Bishop’s School, The Cambridge School and The Rock Academy.
Calvary Christian School and Ocean View Christian Academy are both located in South County.
Francis Parker, La Jolla Country Day, Christian and Bishop’s all draw a segment of their student populations from South County.
The Rock Academy has used South County playing venues at times, especially for the CIF playoffs.
Many more schools in the region could reopen sometime in September. Could that possibly place high school club teams, at least, back on the field by October or November?
Could seven-on-seven football passing drills put a scare into Halloween?
A lot depends on the health and safety protocols being met, of course.
Outdoor classes to minimize the spread of the COVID-19 virus, small class size, social distancing, mask-wearing (for older students) and testing of staff all factor into the equation.
But it’s an encouraging start, even if it only means that high school sports are on schedule to hit the planned winter start.
Master calendar
The San Diego Section has aligned its schedule with that of the state to allow participation in club sports concurrently with the equivalent high school sport for the 2020-21 school term only due to the compression of the schedule.
That means student-athletes could play soccer or water polo (or any other sport) for both their club teams and their high school teams at the same time. Of course, not all club and high school sports seasons overlap.
However, student-athletes will only be allowed 18 hours of practice per week, thus placing limits on how many hours multi-sport athletes can allot to each sport they participate in during a season.
Sundays remain off-limits to contact between high school coaches and their student-athletes, meaning that coaches who coach both club and high school sports teams will not be able to associate with their high school sports student-athletes on that day, thus placing a premium on weekend scheduling.
The San Diego Section Board of Managers approved the 2020-21 master calendar at its Aug. 14 meeting.
The fall season features the following sports: badminton, traditional cheer, boys and girls cross country, field hockey, football, gymnastics, boys and girls volleyball, boys and girls water polo and coed roller hockey.
Practice in fall sports is allowed to start Dec. 12. Many sports can start playing games on Dec. 19, though gymnastics, roller hockey and cross country cannot begin official competitions until Dec. 26.
Football games are scheduled to kick-off on Jan. 8, with teams playing 10 games in 10 weeks. The regular season is scheduled to end on March 12, followed by the start of the section playoffs on March 19.
The San Diego Section and Southern Section have similarly aligned schedules to permit cross-section scheduling.
Coed roller hockey draws a sizable contingent of rosters from field hockey, so it will be interesting to see how many student-athletes elect to play both sports under the current practice time restrictions or choose one sport over the other.
Spring sports include baseball, boys and girls basketball, competitive sport cheer, boys and girls golf, boys and girls lacrosse, boys and girls soccer, softball, swimming and diving, boys and girls tennis and track and field.
Practices for most spring sports can start on March 13, though some can start sooner. The first contest date for most spring sports will be March 20.
