2020 has been a rough year for implementing extracurricular activities into school schedules due to the global pandemic that is COVID-19. With cases that are higher than ever before now in the U.S., events such as sports are risky to put into place. While this year’s football season was able to go through with the restrictions applied to it, it was still difficult to schedule games knowing that there was some sort of danger involved. 

These dangers are being taken into consideration even further with the upcoming basketball season. KSHSAA has been discussing how to go about the basketball season with the rise of virus cases in the state.

Athletic director Matt Biehler said the Board of Directors had a meeting to discuss guidelines for the new basketball season this year and into next year. 

“Depending on what KSHSAA says, our league will have to make restrictions regarding the amount of spectators that can come in and watch the games,” he said.

KSHSAA decided to allow high schools to play their games as scheduled and not postpone them. They also voted down an amendment to allow spectators at games until Jan. 28. Although COVID is at the forefront of many players’ minds, that is not the only concern they have.

“Practice is different from past years. We have a new coach and are having to be wary of the virus by washing our hands and other safety measures, but we can still practice with our masks off,” junior Allyson Lange said. “I don’t think our team will perform too well as we usually would. We’ve lost a lot of experienced players and we are a young team, so this season will be rough.”

With these new changes to practice and the potential delay of games coming from KSHSAA, players have had some different viewpoints and opinions and the whole situation.

“Practice has been going good. The team has been putting in effort and we have some young blood to carry the weight,” senior Max Linn said. “With everything that’s going on, I feel like they (the Board of Directors) should just let kids play. I understand there are risks to this, but I don’t want everything to get taken away from my senior year. I would rather get sick and play, than to not play at all.”