By Freddie Fine
Sports teams at LREI face a lot of adversity heading into the 2020 fall sports season with COVID-19 limiting the ability to practice together safely, leading to both players and coaches being uncertain about the future of this sports season. Anna Gonzalez, Eli Harris, and Shoshi Fine all described how their experiences have been thus far on their respective teams.
The return of in-person school has taken up much of the spotlight since school began in early September. However, the return of school sports has been something that many students and coaches have on the tops of their minds. Sports have been a secondary issue with many unanswered questions as to what it will look like, but some students and teachers have begun online practice and gave insight into what it looks like.
Anna Gonzales is a new teacher at the LREI high school this year and is co-coaching the girls’ varsity soccer team along with Jeremiah Demster, a middle school art teacher. When asked about how zoom practices have been, Anna said that the team is doing circuit workouts together. The workouts are sometimes adapted to help the players with a specific soccer skill. At the end of practice, each player tests themselves to see where they are in that skill area. She said that the plan is to start in-person practices the second week of hybrid school, however, the already small team will have to be split apart since freshman and sophomores are in school on separate days from juniors and seniors, making it difficult for the team to build up chemistry and play with a full 11 players. Another issue is middle schoolers not being allowed to play, which has happened in the past. However, in order to keep everyone separated more middle schoolers cannot attend the in-person practices. Anna hopes to be able to have a season later this year and is optimistic that scientists will be able to find a vaccine as she wants the whole team to be able to compete. A large concern of hers is making sure the seniors on the team can be sent away to college with as proper of a soccer season as possible in 2020.
Eli Harris is a junior participating in cross country this fall. He described their online practices differently because it is difficult to run online together. Their meetings generally consist of stretching and reviewing what they’ve been doing. Since running is an individual sport, members of the team can run on their own time and don’t necessarily have to be together as opposed to soccer. The main roadblock is being able to run safely, and Eli says he runs where there aren’t many people, but when he passes by someone, he will pull his neck gaiter up in order to protect himself and others. He said in-person practices are also going to start on the second week of hybrid school, and they will hopefully run in small groups to regain some of the normality that usual practices would have. He isn’t that optimistic of a season later in the year as cross country is an outdoor sport and difficult to do in the cold, but hopes to have at least one meet.
Shoshi Fine is a freshman on the volleyball team. She described online volleyball practices as being difficult because it is hard to adapt to playing without teammates. For most people, playing inside is out of the question because of the danger of breaking something, but for those who can play, it is difficult to work to improve without other players. She said the practices generally consist of stretching and a workout as well as going into breakout rooms to help strengthen team chemistry. Shoshi thinks they will try to have in-person practices on the second week of hybrid school, but volleyball is an indoor sport, unlike soccer and cross country, making it a bit more difficult to play safely. She hopes that they will have practice, but isn’t so optimistic about a season against other schools later this year for the same reasons.
Across the sports at school, there is a large sense of uncertainty about what’s yet to come. There is no clear answer as people don’t want to be put at risk of becoming sick in order to play sports, however, they remain something that many feel passionate about and want to continue to play safely. In the coming weeks, expect more answers about what in-person practice will look like and hopefully an update about the season.