California punts again on high school sports; athletes say they’re tired of waiting
Caelan Bonniksen, Zelbee Rader and Richie Watts are hurting. So are a good many of their friends and teenage peers.
Bonniksen of El Dorado, Rader of Bella Vista and Watts of Rocklin are normally radiant high school students used to engagement on campus and year-round sports participation. There are only bits and pieces of any of this playing out now. On Sunday, in front of the State Capitol with a monstrous Christmas tree in the background for a “Let us Play!” rally, Bonniksen, Rader and Watts bore glum expressions.
Their extracurricular lives are on hold, the coronavirus pandemic putting a seize on how much schools can open, if at all, and pausing sports seasons.
Then Tuesday came another blow. The state governing body for high school athletics, the California Interscholastic Federation, said it won’t announce guidance for schools to return to practices or competition until after Jan. 1. The CIF also canceled regional and state championships for fall sports.
And so the waiting game will continue indefinitely. The concern and bewilderment of Bonniksen, Rader and Watts in wanting more concrete answers as to why they are not playing sports while 43 other states have played at least some sports is shared by more than 1 million students in California. That’s the number of those who play prep sports or are on a marching band, a dance team or a drum line.
But the football and soccer fields on regional campuses remain empty. Same with volleyball and tennis courts. The bleachers and stands are lonely and silent. None of this expects to change any time soon.
The pandemic is raging in California. Sacramento County is setting daily records for new cases and the state is running out of beds in intensive-care units. The athletes at the Capitol on Sunday aren’t questioning the pandemic, but they say they’re tired of the state punting anything resembling a concrete decision down the field.
The students are running out of time to salvage much of any sports seasons. The halfway point of the academic year looms without any games played; the state seems content to see what happens.
The governor’s office on Tuesday afternoon announced it will delay the release of youth sports guidelines. The delays have led to a lack of clarity and adding to the angst of students. The CIF on Tuesday in a statement to schools and media said that until the governor’s office releases youth sports guidelines, no prep sports will start.
The 10 section commissioners under the governing CIF umbrella have informed member schools things are, in effect, still on hold. Sac-Joaquin Section Commissioner Mike Garrison wrote in a memo to schools, “We could tell you tomorrow, ‘Go play,’ and you would not be able to do so, due to state health restrictions.”
High school sports are losing out to a virus no one had heard of a year ago, meaning we’re all losing out. It is losing out to data and numbers that have county and state health officials alarmed as positive COVID-19 results continue to spike across the state. Gov. Gavin Newsom has touched on youth sports in his daily news briefings, but the state faces an urgent problem now as 51 counties in the state now in the most restrictive purple tier, with hospitalizations in intensive-care wards increasing by nearly 90 percent in recent weeks.
Differing views
The COVID-19 numbers may not alarm parents of a lot of student-athletes, not that they are insensitive to those hurting or dying. Of course, an infected student could infect somebody more at risk of serious complications. But some say the mortality rate for young people from COVID-19 is so small that the risk-reward of returning to sports is worth it, that the toll of not playing is heaping untold harm in terms of mental health.
Each of the student-athletes who attended Sunday’s rally embraced this thinking. They will argue that waivers should be signed by players and parents to ensure nobody would sue a school should someone within their circle come down with the virus. You can feel their conviction.
These students and their parents will argue that football was played in other states amid strict protocols. So why not here? The early summer surge led the CIF to push back the sports calendar to January, and the current spike is more considerable.
When it comes to sports participation, any governing body is going to lean on the insight of science and medicine. In other states, it was deemed safe to play sports, though there were stop and starts, postponements and cancellations.
We’re seeing that play out in college and professional sports, too, with the NFL’s Baltimore Ravens seeing 20 infections spring up in the past two weeks. The Denver Broncos played a game Sunday without a real quarterback, after the team’s signal-callers attended a meeting without masks on and a player was infected with COVID-19.
What students miss and need
Watts had a lot to play for this fall. A tall, skilled quarterback with perfect grades, Watts isn’t just missing touchdown drives.
”Football is more than just games,” he said. “It’s much deeper than that. We need sports to help us shape our lives.”
Rocklin has a hybrid on-campus model of in-person learning, but it’s hollow, Watts said.
”No one is getting excited about a volleyball match on Thursday or a football game on Friday,” he said. “The vibe around school is different. We’re going through slow motions in life. I think we could play football in this state if we all followed protocols. It can be done. We just want a chance.”
Bonniksen, the three-sport athlete from El Dorado, said no activities lead to boredom, which leads to more concerning issues.
“Mental health is a huge worry for those not playing sports or having any extra curricular activities,” Bonniksen said. “Failure rates in some districts have tripled, and drop-out rates are rising. Sports keeps us connected to the community, engaged, motivated.”
Rader, the volleyball player from Bella Vista, spoke Sunday about how her dreams of competing in college were dashed without a fall season. No games meant no visibility. She was emotional in detailing how she turned to partying, hanging out with friends, losing her sense of worth.
“I’ve wound up doing things I’d never do before, but I feel lost,” she said. “A lot of us are feeling lost.”
This story was originally published December 1, 2020 at 5:00 AM.