SJ-O, Heritage, Villa Grove and Oakwood still await final word from IHSA on potential summer games

By FRED KRONER
fred@mahometnews.com

State championships are out of the question in 2020 for athletes and teams that participate in any Illinois High School Association spring sport.

The statewide organization announced that decision last week. However, there is a possible caveat.

At the same time, the IHSA kept open the possibility that some high school games and events could still be held in June, depending on subsequent announcements from Gov. J.B. Pritzker.

In its statement, released on April 21, the IHSA said, “the board also determined that summer contact days are suspended for this year unless state government and medical leaders indicate such gatherings are safe.

“At that time, the Board indicated a willingness to reconsider how summer contact might be conducted, and whether opportunities for schools to conduct some kind of spring athletic events might occur.”

The news should be viewed as a ray of hope and not as a distinct possibility.

Since the IHSA press release, some school districts have taken it upon themselves to put an end to any prospects for spring-sport participation. Several others are letting the situation play out.

Among those saying no more sports for the 2019-20 school year are Mahomet-Seymour, Tuscola, Champaign Central and Centennial.

M-S athletic director Matt Hensley explained the district’s rationale.

“Mahomet-Seymour Schools will not compete if the current suspension of spring sports is lifted,” Hensley said. “Throughout this time, our school district has focused on three priorities.

“—The health of our staff and their families;

“—The health of our students, our families and our community;

“—Clear communication.

“We believe that the resumption of spring sports would put these priorities at risk.”

By contrast, St. Joseph-Ogden has not ruled out the possibility of holding some contests in June.

However, prior to then, the ban continues.

“We will not play any games, or have any spring practices, while school is in session under Remote Learning,” superintendent Brian Brooks said. “No school can in May now anyway, due to the Stay at Home order being extended, but we told our coaches the day of the IHSA announcement that nothing would be allowed until June at the earliest.”

Whether anything can resume at that time is still to be determined.

“We have left the door open for our teams to have a few last practices, scrimmages, or games in June if the Governor and Health Department were to allow these types of things to happen,” Brooks said. “It is probably a long shot at this point, but we didn’t feel the need to completely close the door on these kids who have lost their entire spring.”

Brooks said the district wants to do everything possible in the hopes that spring sport athletes can have at least a limited chance to participate.

“The easy decision would have been for us to just cancel everything, but we felt that isn’t the right decision for us at this point,” Brooks said. “If they have an opportunity to have one last practice, scrimmage, etc., to give them some closure, we want to provide that for them, if the student-athletes and coaches want to do that.

“These kids have lost everything in terms of high school experiences this spring. Maybe our seniors get one last time to ‘put on the uniform’ and their parents get one last chance to watch their kids do something they love to do.

“This is probably a long shot at this point, but we didn’t want to shut that door for them in April.”

Brooks acknowledged there was originally some confusion by the wording of the IHSA announcement, but said the statements were necessary in order to officially extend the season, which otherwise would have ended in late May or early June.

“Many schools were upset with the IHSA announcement, as I think they took it as the IHSA promoting teams to possibly practice and/or play games while we were in the middle of Remote Learning,” Brooks said. “The wording of the announcement could have possibly been more specific, but we never took it that way.

“We took their announcement as the IHSA being at a point where they had to announce that the IHSA postseasons had to unfortunately be cancelled.

“We think they wanted to allow teams/players the opportunity for closure still if allowed to this summer even if the opportunity for a true season/postseason has been lost.”

Had the announcement not been made, any athletes or programs which resumed practice or competition – even for a scrimmage – would have put students’ future eligibility at risk.

“If that decision wasn’t formally made by the IHSA, then any team that even practiced or scrimmaged would have put their next season’s team in jeopardy of facing ramifications due to practicing outside of their season and thus violating an IHSA bylaw,” Brooks said.

Meanwhile, athletes at Villa Grove/Heritage and Oakwood remain in limbo.

“The Vermilion Valley Conference athletic directors have a video meeting scheduled for May 6th at 9 a.m. to see what we want to do as a conference concerning spring sports,” Oakwood athletic director John Odle said. “We will wait to see what comes out of the meeting and make a decision at that time.

“We want to give our athletes every chance to compete, but will always look at keeping them safe in the process.”

Heritage athletic director Lori Archer said her district and Villa Grove remain in a mode of uncertainty.

“As of right now, we are waiting to see if the IHSA gives any more guidance as far as the possibility of playing a few games,” Archer said. “Because of the co-op, we want to be consistent and have both schools do the same thing.

“The Villa Grove softball team is in favor of trying to get a few games in, so we are following suit as far as baseball goes.”

For the public schools in Champaign Unit 4, the decision to end sports for the spring is a desire to follow district policy.

“We will not be participating due to the fact that our schools are closed,” Centennial athletic director Tony Millard said. “This is a policy that we follow for snow days and we will be following them during this period as well.

“Now that the governor has instituted the stay at home through May, this substantially ends the spring sports season.”

For Tuscola, athletic director Ryan Hornaday said, “We looked at it like this … if the government deems it not safe to be in school, there’s no way we could possibly think it’s safe to have sporting events.”