CIAC Brings Back Winter Sports

by: Michael Schneider and Gustavo Reyes

The CIAC has announced that the winter season is back on. We are now two weeks into this winter season and teams have been practicing and even having scrimmages.

Due to the pandemic, teams have shortened their seasons and there will be no state tournament. The teams started tryouts and practices on January 19, with games as early as February 1.

The CIAC assessed each sport’s risk level for COVID-19 transmission. The only sport categorized as low-risk is swimming, all the sports considered as moderate-risk are basketball, ice hockey, gymnastics, and indoor track, and the ones considered as high-risk are wrestling, competitive cheer, and competitive dance. 

Even if indoor track is considered as a moderate-risk sport CIAC recommends not holding large, multi school meets throughout the season. Even if it's not clear for an alternative option for the meets, at WHS there will be intrasquad competitions and time trials instead.  

Senior captain of the hockey team Kevin Avery says, “We are all pretty excited about this upcoming season even though it’s not a normal one, at least we get one last season to remember.”

How sports have changed

This season is definitely one to remember for everyone. Practices have everyone wearing a mask and there are no scrimmages during practice till after the 1st of February.

The Central Connecticut Conference is going to be different as well. Teams will only play other teams that are close to each other geographically.

The high-risk considered sports have to be limited to have small group conditioning and non-contact skill building activities for the entire season. 

After last season's abrupt end to the post season tournament, the CIAC have announced that there will not be a postseason tournament this year due to pandemic.

However, there will be some postseason experience with an inter-conference tournament. It will be a 2 game playoff between the 4 best teams so that their season still goes on.

Although this isn’t your traditional season, it at least gives students a chance to have some sort of a season.

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