SEATTLE — Four western Washington high schools are canceling their early-season football games after some positive COVID-19 tests and exposures to the virus within their teams.
The high school football teams at North Mason, Bremerton, Lake Stevens and Spanaway Lake will not kick off their season as planned. Each team had only one or two players impacted, however, because football is a skilled position sport, the athletic directors decided it would be best for their team to be sidelined.
With these cancellations, the start of this fall’s high school football season looks eerily similar to last year.
“Go back a year ago, this last spring and having to cancel the season for the first time, then you're in a state of not knowing if we're ever going to get the opportunity to let kids play again,” recalled Mick Hoffman, the executive director of the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association (WIAA).
While the entire season isn’t canceled, the surge of the delta variant is sacking hundreds of student-athletes for the start of the season.
“The bigger thing is, you know, kids only get so many games. And think back to when we were kids, and there's a rainout; just that feeling of disappointment, right?" Hoffman said. "And, at nine, 10 years old, you anticipate being able to do it forever. Well, you know, as our kids get older, they realize there's only so many seasons left for them, less than 4% are going to go play in college. For most of them, this is it. So yeah, it's a gut shot to us. But, you know, for those we serve, it's even worse.”
Schools across Washington have received guidance from Gov. Jay Inslee and the Washington Department of Health on how to approach this athletic season as COVID-19 continues to impact the Evergreen State.
“We know not everybody's gonna be happy. No one's happy, honestly,” Hoffman noted. He explained that his priority is keeping student-athletes safe. He said schools are also working with risk management attorneys to ensure the rules are applied fairly and safely.
“Those groups are at least listening now and trying to provide more opportunity than what we've seen in the past. So we're thankful for that and we'll eventually get to where we all want to be.”
Moving forward, the WIAA is working closely with schools all over the state to track the ever-changing conditions caused by the ongoing pandemic.
“In the interim, hey, we got kids playing this year that weren't playing last year at this time,” said Hoffman, who is optimistic a complete football season will be played.
“We'll hopefully all do our part. And we'll get to a final place where we can burn masks altogether. We don't have to have the debate over the vaccine so that we can move forward and focus on what our kids are getting out of the experience and take the adult concerns out of it.”
Hoffman told KING 5 that if things go south with the delta variant or any other subsequent variant, the WIAA and area athletic departments will pivot and do what’s best for the athletes.
As far as the games that were canceled, they were not league games so they won’t have any bearing on the post-season, which Hoffman said, at this point, is still set to happen as planned.