COLUMBUS – With the announcement by Gov. Mike DeWine that Ohio school facilities would not reopen this school year due to the coronavirus outbreak, the governing body of high school sports in Ohio announced that spring sports would be canceled and its executive director said the organization’s attention had turned to salvaging fall sports in the state.
The Ohio High School Athletic Association informed member schools Monday that spring sports would be canceled, including baseball, softball, tennis, and track and field.
The OHSAA had told school officials weeks ago that spring sports would be canceled if schools remained closed past the scheduled May 1 reopening date.
With athletic facilities shut down, executive director Jerry Snodgrass said it would be impossible to ensure the health and safety of athletes and support personnel involved in practices and competitions, a concern that extends into the summer months when schools begin preparing for fall sports.
“July is a very physical month for our student-athletes entering fall sports,” Snodgrass said. “So we have already started looking at, if this continues through the summer, we’ll have the potential of having a lot of kids who haven’t had the physical activity that they would normally have going into a fall season. So for the health and safety of everyone, we have to look at the acclimation periods going into the fall.”
He said a sports medicine advisory group is studying the possibility that athletes would have time to complete required physical exams while the organization also considers aspects of fall competition, such as the safety of playing surfaces and academic eligibility.