Recently, Connecticut governor Ned Lamont revisited his COVID-19 guidelines regarding winter sports and their restrictions. But what do student-athletes have to say about them? Primarily, the guidelines stated that low and moderate-risk sports such as basketball and ice hockey were allowed to begin full practices on January 19, and games between schools will be able to resume on February 1, as long as both schools are in the state of Connecticut. Sports that have been deemed high risk, like wrestling, will still be restricted to conditioning and non-contact drills. The statement from Lamont’s office also covered safety requirements for the sports that are allowed to resume full practices and games. Masks are required for all players, coaches, and spectators in both indoor and outdoor sports, and similar to the fall season, each player is only allowed to bring one spectator to games. Masks are also required for players and coaches of high-risk sports, with no spectators allowed. Lamont has yet to set a date to revisit these new guidelines, but it’s likely that they will remain in effect until the end of the winter sports season. I asked two students to describe their experiences with winter sports and how they felt about the new guidelines.

“They’re certainly better than they were before,” said Alexander Raezer of the boys hockey team. “Playing with a mask is still pretty annoying but as long as we get to play games I’m happy.” Kelly Holmgren, who plays girls basketball, agreed, saying, “I think it’s important to keep doing things that we did before the pandemic to give us a sense of normalcy, whether that’s practicing in normal-sized groups or playing games.” Before January 20, basketball practices were split up into two 45-minute sessions, one for weightlifting with Coach Turner and one for non-contact basketball drills in small groups. Hockey practices allowed no more than four players on the ice at a time with only 30 minutes to practice for each group. Before the new guidelines, most student-athletes were frustrated with the practices, especially the lack of contact and inability to scrimmage. But with Lamont’s new guidelines and contact returning to full-team practices, student-athletes are relieved to finally get a chance to scrimmage and do contact drills. “Now that we are all in one gym, we can run through plays and have more game-like practices, allowing us to develop and get better in more ways than non-contact drills can,” Kelly stated, and Alexander was clearly excited too. “It was frustrating doing such small practices where it felt like we didn’t accomplish anything,” he said. “With two-hour practices, we can improve much more than we were before.” When I asked about being able to start games again, Alexander simply replied, “I’m ecstatic. Hockey is my favorite sport and I’ve been pretty disappointed about not being able to play games for a while. For me, sports are about the pressure situations that make the game fun, and we haven’t been able to have those without games.” Kelly shared his excitement, saying, “I’m really happy because basketball is very important to me. Being able to play games is giving us something to look forward to, both in the short and long term.

I also got the chance to speak with Mr. Helstein, Athletic director at GCDS, about his point of view on the new guidelines. “It’s an exciting time,” he said. “We had to come up with a perfect strategy, both fitness-wise and safety-wise, and the goal is to create some competition against our neighboring schools.” Mr. Helstein was also really excited about the chance to finally schedule games, as was allowed by Lamont’s new guidelines. “As a league, we and the other FAA schools have decided to have ‘scrimmage days’ on Saturdays.” This is great news for student-athletes: these so-called ‘scrimmage days’ will be just like regular school games, but on Saturdays to make transportation easier and safer. For hockey, where it’s sometimes hard to get ice time for games on weekends, some games will be held on weekdays, with transportation (safely) provided by the school. “We’ll use a few large buses or many small buses to ensure safe transportation, and we’re only scheduling games with schools that are close to us so that students are not on the bus in close proximity of one another for too long,” Mr. Helstein explained. When I asked what he thought the rest of the winter sports season might look like, he chuckled and said, “Knock on wood, I think it will be another successful time, similar to the fall [season], where we were able to create games against other schools and also get a gauge of where we are in the school’s first year up at the varsity level. Of course, it’s still unfortunate that some of our student-athletes can’t have a normal season’s experience, but the timing of all this has worked to the advantage of our school because these games don’t count toward a final league standing. Instead, they give us a chance to get experience and exposure at the varsity level against some top teams.” 

Governor Lamont’s new guidelines seem to have returned at least some sense of normalcy to winter sports during the COVID-19 pandemic. While mask-wearing still proves to be a challenge for student-athletes during sports, they have worked through the challenge and are finally being rewarded for their perseverance. Full team practices are officially back for both basketball and hockey, and games are being scheduled by Mr. Helstein and the rest of the athletic department. Student-athletes are elated to be practicing in full again, and they are even more excited about the idea of finally being able to compete against other schools at the varsity level. These new guidelines and opportunities have given student-athletes a mental boost as they now prepare for the season ahead of them.