Kansas high school sports return after COVID-19 cancels all activity for 80 days
When Heights football coach Dominick Dingle got in his car to go to work Monday, he got a little emotional. He wasn’t hitting the Monday blues; he was finding a new appreciation for his job and the Falcons he coaches.
Kansas high school sports resumed Monday after an 80-day hiatus because of the COVID-19 pandemic. March 12 was the last time any athlete in the Sunflower State competed, and Saturday was supposed to be the final day of the spring sports season. Not every high school’s athletes were back to practice Monday, but those who were found a release from the turbulent circumstances the world is facing.
“The daily interaction with kids in USD 259, we have a lot of roles that we play as educators, as coaches, as teachers for our young men,” Dingle said. “I’ve always tried to take things one day at a time, but it did make you take a step back. It changed our way of thinking of what was actually important to us.
“Are we teaching? Are we coaching? Are we molding? All of those things definitely come into play now moving forward.”
At Heights, the Falcons set up non-football drills, like weaving through cones or running through a speed ladder. USD 259 has restricted its student-athletes from using the indoor weight room until later in June, so Dingle said he plans to bring parts of the weight room to the field.
“If we do our part and we progress, we will have a season, but if we try to circumvent the wheel and move into the different phases a little bit quicker, that may hinder us,” Dingle said.
At Bishop Carroll, the Golden Eagles’ football players ran from one side of campus to the other, cycling from one workout station to the next. Across Kansas, athletes were split into groups of about 15. They couldn’t share water, and they worked out while maintaining social distancing where possible.
It wasn’t perfect, but at least sports were back, Carroll coach Dusty Trail said.
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Trail said that when the Kansas State High School Activities Association (KSHSAA) canceled all sports through the end of the 2019-20 school year, he and his staff started holding weekly video conference calls. Every week, they reviewed the restrictions and tried to formulate a plan for the future.
Those plans changed every week as COVID-19 grew and the curve was eventually flattened. Trail said he was just happy to see his players’ faces every Monday morning.
“We missed these guys a lot,” Trail said. “These kids have goals, and our job as coaches is to help them achieve those goals. When you can’t do that — and it’s something I’ve been doing for 30-plus years — it’s difficult. That’s our life. Right now, it’s these kids’ lives. Being able to be around each other at school and participate in athletics, that’s very important to these kids, and it does have an effect on you mentally when it’s taken away.”
Each city in Kansas has come to its own conclusions on how to reintroduce high school athletics. In Andover, the Trojan football team is under new leadership in Ken Dusenbury, formerly of Garden Plain. Dusenbury said he won’t get to work with his new players until June 8, and the weight room won’t be available until June 29 if everything goes according to plan.
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About 15 minutes south, in Derby, coach Brandon Clark is starting his 15th season with the Panthers and is looking for his third straight undefeated season in 2020. Derby has opened its weight room, Clark said.
All equipment will be cleaned after each use. The middle school groups, which normally works out with the high schoolers to create a sense of community, has been moved back to the middle schools. The athletes have been put into groups of 20-24, and those will be the same groups the athletes will spend every workout with this summer. When the weight room workouts are complete, the room will be disinfected again, with a disinfectant fogging to follow.
Every city will re-acclimate to everyday life a little differently, which will give some programs slight advantages that others might not have. But there are bigger problems in the world than football records, Trail said.
On Saturday, Heights senior Maliq Little was in downtown Wichita at a peaceful protest in response to the death of George Floyd in Minnesota. He said he believes that it is important to make his voice heard in the fight against racism in America. That said, waking up early to go to practice was a nice escape — even just for a moment.
“It felt good to be around a group of people again, especially my family on this field,” Little said. “It felt really good, and I’m glad to get back to work.”
This story was originally published June 1, 2020 at 4:44 PM.