OHSAA cancels season

COLUMBUS, Ohio — It’s official. Sports will not be played this spring in Ohio.

The Ohio High School Athletic Association formally canceled spring sports Monday in the wake of Gov. Mike DeWine’s orders to close schools for the remainder of the academic year.

“As we stated in our previous communication, (Monday’s) announcement by Gov. DeWine to close schools for the remainder of the 2019-20 school year also will now result in the cancellation of OHSAA-sponsored spring sports seasons including tournaments,” OHSAA executive director Jerry Snodgrass wrote in a memo to school administrators Monday.

Ohio becomes the 31st state to cancel spring sports because of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Three neighboring states — Indiana, Michigan and Pennsylvania — had already nixed their respective spring sports seasons. Kentucky and West Virginia have suspended their seasons.

Monday’s announcement ends more than a month Ohio athletes had been in limbo as to whether or not they’d get to compete this spring.

On March 12, the day the girls basketball state tournament was set to begin, the OHSAA announced it was postponing the tournaments as well as the remainder of the boys basketball, ice hockey and wrestling tournaments.

Two weeks later the organization officially canceled those respective tournaments, but was optimistic to hold a spring sports season once schools were allowed to reopen May 1.

Earlier this month, state associations across the country began canceling their respective spring sports seasons. Indiana nixed its season April 2, and Michigan followed the next day.

On April 8, Ohio, still hopeful spring sports could happen, announced a revised spring sports schedule.

A day later, Pennsylvania canceled its spring sports season.

In an interview Monday afternoon, Snodgrass addressed summer and the start of fall sports.

“July is a very physical month for our student-athletes entering fall sports, 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 the fall season,” he said. “So for the health and safety of everyone, we have to look at the acclimation periods going into the fall if that happens. We have to be prepared for that.

“We’re also talking about that, if this does go through the summer, what is the likelihood that a student can get in to get a physical (annual medical exam). We have a sport medicine advisory group that is looking at that. They are looking at all aspects such as whether artificial surfaces need to be treated.”