Caledonia High School volleyball coach Samantha Brooks remembers the painful end to her two kids’ final high school sports seasons this spring.
When Tori’s softball season and Tony’s baseball season were suspended and eventually canceled due to the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic, it was “devastating,” Brooks said.
So when the Mississippi High School Activities Association executive committee voted Tuesday to delay the start of fall sports — volleyball, football, cross country and swimming — by two weeks, Brooks was happy that the dedicated players on her team won’t have to experience the same feeling (yet, anyway).
“I am glad that it’s been pushed back,” Brooks said. “I feel like that was a safe option.”
That was the consensus Tuesday afternoon as The Dispatch spoke to Brooks and several local high school football coaches whose teams were affected by the MHSAA’s decision.
New Hope coach Wade Tackett, Columbus High coach Joshua Pulphus and West Point coach Chris Chambless all said they anticipated Mississippi’s governing body on public high school athletics would make the decision it did Tuesday, and all three coaches said they were similarly happy with the choice.
“I’m glad my guys are getting an opportunity to play a football season,” Tackett said.
That season is now slated to begin Sept. 4 rather than the original start date of Aug. 21, but Tackett and the Trojans will happily take 10 regular-season games over none at all.
“It’s hard not to be optimistic right now,” Tackett said. “I think every football coach in the state of Mississippi and every football player is pretty ecstatic over the fact that we’re going to get some kind of season.”
What it will look like
With the MHSAA’s two-week postponement for practice and competition in all four fall sports, volleyball, cross country and swimming can now start practice Aug. 10 and begin competition Aug. 24.
Brooks said the decision was a “blessing” that will allow her players to get acclimated to the fall semester rather than rush into game play as usual. According to Tuesday’s news release from the MHSAA, that was precisely the plan.
“The board felt these changes will give all of us more time to try to get back into the routine of school,” Executive Committee President Kalvin Robinson said in the release. “There are going to be many challenges — ones we’re anticipating and those we don’t even know about yet — in returning to on-campus learning. It’s going to be different than what we’ve experienced in the past. Hopefully pushing back the start of the fall sports seasons will help make that transition a little smoother for everyone involved.”
Pulphus and Chambless both said the delay is a helpful break after complications with each school’s summer workouts. Slow to receive personal protective equipment (PPE) for coaches, the Falcons didn’t begin conditioning until last week; West Point resumed workouts Monday after players with COVID-19 symptoms (who ultimately tested negative) prompted a shutdown two weeks prior.
“They’re doing the smart thing as far as giving us more time,” Chambless said. “There was no way I was going to be ready to start practice Aug. 3.”
Instead, the Green Wave and the rest of Mississippi’s public schools will get until Aug. 17 to continue their current summer workouts before practice begins. On Aug. 19, players are allowed to wear “shells” — shoulder pads, shorts and helmets — and full gear is allowed Aug. 24. Scrimmages against one other team are permitted on Aug. 28.
Scheduling shake-up
Columbus was scheduled to start its season Aug. 21 at home against Provine and wide receiver Deion Smith, an LSU commit; a home matchup with rival Noxubee County was set to follow.
Now, the Falcons’ first two contests have been wiped off the schedule and won’t be made up.
That leaves Columbus with just three home games — New Hope, Lake Cormorant and Saltillo — and seven road matchups, beginning with a visit to Class 4A power Louisville. The Falcons’ next two games (at Lanier and DeSoto Central) are on the road, too.
“It makes our journey a whole lot tougher,” Pulphus said.
Columbus isn’t the only team whose schedule will be profoundly affected by the delay. West Point also loses a pair of home contests with Horn Lake and Louisville; the Wildcats were the only team to beat the Green Wave in a fourth straight championship campaign.
“I don’t necessarily like losing two home games, but it is what it is,” Chambless said.
Now, West Point’s season opener is Sept. 4 at powerhouse Starkville.
It’s a tough task, but “we’re up to the challenge,” Chambless said.
New Hope will lose its Week 1 road rivalry game at Caledonia and its Week 2 home game against Shannon. The Trojans will visit Houston on Sept. 4 for their season opener.
Brooks said the new schedule eliminates Caledonia volleyball’s early-season contests with New Hope, New Albany and Tupelo, all of whom are competitive opponents.
“They really kind of help prepare us for district and toward advancement in the playoffs,” Brooks said.
The MHSAA will permit make-up volleyball games provided both schools agree, and Brooks hopes to set something up. She said the team also has a district game scheduled in the season’s first two weeks and will have to reschedule.
But despite her concerns about the safety of tournaments this fall and the pressure of squeezing matches into a typical two-contest week, Brooks said she’s still pleased just to have a season to prepare for.
“I will just be happy if we can have a season for the girls and let them compete,” Brooks said.
Optimism despite uncertainty
Chambless, who said MHSAA’s decision Tuesday was the organization’s “Plan A” for fall sports, doesn’t know what Plan B was and hopes he won’t have to find out.
For now, the coach, who describes himself as a positive person and an optimist, will stay that way.
“I see the glass half full. I think things will get better,” Chambless said. “You just have to play with the hand dealt you every day. That’s what we’re teaching kids: Just stay as positive as you can, and then when it’s time to get to work, get to work.”
Pulphus and Tackett both said having firm start dates for practice and competition is a good sign sports will happen as currently scheduled. The New Hope coach said that making the call more than a month before the start of the season was welcome, too.
“I’m just glad they didn’t kick the can down the road and went ahead and made a decision now,” Tackett said.
Brooks said she’s “ecstatic” that the season wasn’t canceled — but she knows things could change, as they have done plenty over the past four months.
“I will remain optimistic until further notice,” she said.
Being in public, Brooks acknowledged, is a risk in and of itself, let alone bringing players together and introducing another team into the gym or onto the field.
“You don’t want kids to catch something and take it back home to their great-aunties or grandmothers or somebody who’s sick,” Pulphus said.
Even outside of workouts, he has encouraged his players to wear masks and avoid social gatherings. So far, it’s worked, as the Falcons have managed to avoid any positive COVID-19 tests to date.
But there are 51 days from Wednesday to the new start of the high school football season, and the coaches agreed any future predictions on how things will play out will be nearly impossible to make.
“We don’t know what tomorrow holds,” Pulphus said.
Theo DeRosa reports on Mississippi State sports for The Dispatch. Follow him on Twitter at @Theo_DeRosa.
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