Sports

Bay State Conference Schools To Decide On Fall Sports Next Week

The BSC announced athletic directors will meet after coronavirus rules modifications were announced Friday to discuss fall season.

The Brookline girls soccer program is among those still waiting on coronavirus-related rules modifications and the green light to play this fall.
The Brookline girls soccer program is among those still waiting on coronavirus-related rules modifications and the green light to play this fall. (Scott Souza/Patch)

WEYMOUTH, MA — With the start of fall practices three weeks away, the Bay State Conference will determine next week if and how the member schools will field teams this fall.

The BSC athletic directors collectively said they will meet next week — after the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association announced rules modifications to lessen accidental contact and provide for social distancing during competition on Friday.

"We are confident, with each school's leadership, will do what is in the best interest of our student athletes and communities," the BSC said in a statement. "More information to follow."

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The BSC includes Braintree, Brookline, Framingham, Milton, Needham, Newton North, Natick, Walpole, Wellesley and Weymouth.

The MIAA released significant rules modifications — aimed at limiting physical contact and enforcing social distancing even during competitions — include no headers, throw-ins or goal kicks beyond midfield in soccer, 7-v-7 play and no penalty corners in field hockey, no plays at the net in volleyball and staggered starts and distanced finishes in cross country.

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Soccer and volleyball players are required to wear masks when within 10 feet of other players during competitions.

The patient approach comes as the Northeastern Conference announced this week that it was moving all fall sports to the MIAA "wedge" season scheduled to run from late February to April, while the Hockomock League athletic directors announced plans to proceed with modified rules in soccer, field hockey, cross country and golf (if applicable), but delay girls volleyball to the wedge season, along with football and competitive cheer, which the MIAA mandated be shifted out of the fall.

The decision to move girls volleyball to late winter was because the sport is contested indoors — where the spread of the coronavirus is considered much more prevalent — and because schools may require gymnasiums for additional socially distanced classrooms. The BSC also has schools that compete in girls swimming and diving indoors in the fall season.

The remaining sports the state has determined to be "lower risk" and "moderate risk" still face obstacles in their return to competition, including transportation issues and that schools committees that have chosen fully remote-learning options to start the school year would require school committee approval to still field athletic teams while no students are allowed in schools.

The MIAA Board of Directors assigned individual sport task forces to come up with modifications to deliver to the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.

Even in sports that are considered lesser-contact sports, the resulting modifications will change the face of those sports as athletes have come to know them.

The MIAA also voted on Aug. 18 to eliminate state tournaments for at least fall sports — reinforcing the idea that sports this year will be more about the experience to play than proving which team is the best day in and day out under a dramatically different landscape of rules.

The fall season is allowed to begin on Sept. 18.

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