Coronavirus puts MCHS sports on hold
By Owen Pugh, sports editor
Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the fate of Maria Carrillo High School’s spring sports is still up in the air. For now until at least May 1, no practices nor games will take place.
School is out now until May 1st and according to Santa Rosa City School, while we are practicing distanced learning there is to be no games nor practices for any sport. This date is tentative, meaning it could be pushed up or back, but for now no sports until at least May.
On March 17, the California Interscholastic Federation held a conference with its state office and the commissioners of each of the 10 sections that make up the CIF to decide the future of California’s high school spring sports. They determined that at that time they could not determine what the right move was. The same group plans to reconvene and decide how high school spring sports will move forward on April 3.
“While the time may come when we have to cancel post-season events, today is not that day. In anticipation of further guidance and directives issued by federal, state and local government agencies regarding COVID-19, the CIF has not determined the future of spring sports events at this time,” Ron Nocetti, the CIF’s executive director, wrote in a press release on March 17.
If the CIF decided to cancel its post-season events, then the next step would be for each of the sections and leagues to decide how they would proceed with their seasons. At this time, neither the North Coast Section nor the North Bay League, the respective section and league that MCHS belongs to, have yet to issue statements of what they would do if the CIF put the kibosh on their state-wide events. Just because state championships could be canceled does not necessarily mean that regional championships or league competitions would automatically be canceled.
Regardless of what happens with the spring season, MCHS student-athletes will still be awarded P.E. credit for the spring season if they are currently on a spring roster.
California Governor Gavin Newsom has publicly stated that he does not think that schools will reopen again this school year. Newsom’s statement along with the NCAA canceling all of its spring sports for the 2020 school year, nearly every professional sports league suspending their seasons indefinitely and most recently the postponement of the Olympic Games because of the coronavirus gives many student-athletes little hope of continuing their seasons. For now, all many student-athletes can do is keep their fingers crossed and stay healthy.