With winter sports officially cancelled for this season, many hopeful athletes, especially the seniors among them, were left disappointed by a year ravaged by the onset of COVID-19. Among these teams were the beloved Ice Knights who have long been the biggest crowd-drawer of any Geneseo sports team.
There still may be a chance that we can see these teams in action; however, as there is a possibility that winter sports will be played in the spring. While there are definite concerns attached with having so many active teams at once, it is a risk that is worth taking for both the college and for the student athletes.
Before diving into exactly why this is worth the risk, let us instead address the issues that having winter sports resume in the spring could bring up. First, there is a chance that the gym and the outside stadiums will be overcrowded, and with COVID-19, this presents a massive issue.
To address this, the school will have to come to the realization that if teams are to start again, there will need to be a massive decline in the ability of teams to practice as they normally would. Now, practices will have to be shorter, irregularly timed, made up into small, isolated groups and spread all over the fields and the gyms of Geneseo.
This would mean that, give or take, 19 teams would all be practicing and possibly competing at the same time which does not sound ideal by any means, but if Geneseo were to adopt the methods of teams like track and field and ultimate frisbee that are still active. it could work. These teams are training in pods and almost exclusively outside. Adopting these methods would give a huge boost to students that have all but lost hope that their final year or years as a student athlete at Geneseo will go to waste.
Second, there are concerns that teams may contract COVID-19 during travel or during practices where masks might not always be on or secured. In this case, I think it would be best for Geneseo to either cancel most of the travel involved in sports to adopt the intra-team matchup format used by track and field or to allow small amounts of travel to schools that have been doing well in terms of COVID-19.
This all hinges on the availability of a vaccine in the spring more than anything. If there were to be a vaccine that could easily be obtained, then this strict plan would be loosened and maybe sports would be allowed to go back to a normal plan, but as of now, the plan that Geneseo should adopt, in spite of its risk, is to slowly experiment with the idea of having winter sports moved to spring.
It can be accomplished with a tight schedule that will likely have to have some off days and awkward schedules for teams plus minimal travel or competition with other teams, but for many students even practicing and being a team again is more than enough.
The final concern is that the school will lose money and that this will not satisfy the need for teams to compete and prove themselves as the best in their divisions. For this issue, I have to say that there is not a great chance of making a profit or of having competition between other teams.
This does not mean that the students who have waited a whole semester and played their hearts out in their years at Geneseo do not deserve a toned-down semester because they clearly do. One of the most common themes amongst all the sports teams here is the sense of identity and the bonds that come with being part of a team—this is what I am really advocating for. If there is a chance that the school and its administration can reclaim that for the students, even in the smallest capacity, then they need to go out and grab it.