Prep notes: Sports rallies set for Friday across the state; Lamson, Patu opt out
A good many high school coaches, parents, athletes and fans across California remain united in pleading for a chance to have sports play out this academic year. Or to at least have a chance to give it a go.
This, of course, includes the headliner sport of football, which has the most participants and largest following, thus generating the sort of revenue that helps fund all sports programs on campus. Prep sports have not happened on high school campuses since March, when the coronavirus pandemic first took hold, shuttering schools.
This did not include club sports, such as the start-up football program in Sacramento, that are not affiliated with any particular high school.
A statewide Facebook page called the Golden State HS Football Coaches Community created by Patrick Walsh of Serra High in San Mateo and Justin Alumbaugh of De La Salle of Concord has raised interest. So has the Facebook page “Let Them Play,” which has nearly 30,000 followers.
Many from that page have sent out notices on social media to invite people to attend simultaneous rallies across the state at 4 p.m. Friday in an effort to be seen and heard, and to express their concerns, including the mental toll on students not able to compete in athletics.
Local rallies will be held in Placer County, El Dorado County and Sacramento County. The event scheduled at the state Capitol in Sacramento, where students and parents met in November to express concerns, frustration and anger of the delays to sports seasons, was canceled after a permit was not granted, siting safety concerns.
Those attending the rallies are encouraged to wear school colors and masks, and hold signs that read “Let Them Play.”
Data inspires confidence, but is the CIF pulling the plug?
What inspires a lot of those following this movement is the data collected by 200 statewide coaches for all sports in the state. The numbers, according to their study, show that more than 700,000 workouts from nearly 16,000 athletes since June resulted in just five reported cases of COVID-19 tied to the conditioning/workouts.
The coaches in the study estimated they attended a total of some 100,000 workouts and one coach tested positive tied to the group settings. The gist coaches derive from the data: prep sports gatherings are not superspreaders.
The California Interscholastic Federation’s 10 section commissioners and the main CIF office in Sacramento have been in regular contact with each other. They all stress that science dictates the pace and that prep sports still needs clearance from the California Department of Public Health to resume full competition.
The CDPH announced last month that prep sports in California would not start before Jan. 25, per its updated youth sports guidelines.
Contrary to speculation, the CIF is not going to make any announcement to pull the plug on prep sports on Friday. The CIF sets a calendar of when sports can be played. It is possible that some counties in the state will be cleared to play some sports while others may not, depending on the color-tiered system put out by the CDPH.
Sports such as football will not be allowed until counties are in the orange reopening tier. As of this week, the Sacramento region is in the purple tier, two steps from orange.
Justin Lamson enrolled at Syracuse
Justin Lamson, The Bee’s 2019 Player of the Year from Oak Ridge, has graduated early and enrolled at Syracuse, where the quarterback weeks ago signed a letter of intent to play on scholarship.
Lamson’s hope was to have a high school spring season, even if just a handful of games, but he graduated early “due to the uncertain circumstances of football in California.”
The opportunity was too good to pass up, he said. Oak Ridge entered the fall as The Bee’s top-ranked team.
Ari Patu already enrolled at Stanford
Folsom’s next star quarterback never had a chance to be a full-time starter with the program as COVID-19 wiped out a fall season.
Patu jumped at the chance to enroll at Stanford, where he signed a scholarship package, and made history.
“We are thrilled to welcome Ari and Jaden to the Stanford family,” Athletics Director Bernard Muir said in a statement. “The disruptions caused by COVID-19 and the nontraditional 2020-21 academic calendar provided a unique opportunity for these two student-athletes to begin their Stanford journey early, and we are grateful that this arrangement was supported by our university administration.”
This story was originally published January 14, 2021 at 7:21 AM.