Spring sports are coming back.
The spring high school sports season, which was canceled in its entirety as the coronavirus pandemic raged through New Jersey in early 2020, will extend deeper into the calendar than usual in 2021.
The New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association, which governs high school sports in New Jersey, announced its plans for the upcoming spring season, identified as Season 4, on Friday morning in a memo to member schools.
Here’s what Season 4 will look like:
- Competition for all sports besides golf will begin on April 19 and conclude on June 20. Golf will begin on April 9.
- Practices for all sports besides boys tennis will begin on April 1. Practices for boys tennis will begin on March 26. Virtual contact for all sports will begin on March 1.
- NJSIAA postseason dates, so the state tournament, for all sports besides boys tennis and golf — boys lacrosse, girls lacrosse, baseball, softball, track and field, boys volleyball — will be from June 1-June 20. Exact tournament regulations are still to be announced by the NJSIAA. State tournament dates for boys tennis and golf are still to be determined. Teams that elect to not play in the postseason can continue to play regular season games through June 20.
- An early start for pitchers and catchers in baseball and softball will be March 26.
- State tournament regulations — along with sports-specific guidelines — will be released by Feb. 15.
Since the summer, the NJSIAA has remained steadfast with its intentions to deliver as full a season as possible for the spring athletes that lost everything last year.
“I think it is important to acknowledge that the members of this task force have always remained focused on providing a participation opportunity for every sport in every season, while striving to provide spring sports with as normal a season as possible,” NJSIAA Chief Operating Officer Colleen Maguire said Wednesday.
In a normal year, the spring season is played in 10-12 weeks with a start date in late March for lacrosse and early April for everything else and an end date in the second week in June. Under this plan, the season will last nine weeks and won’t force any players to choose between sports, even in this year’s four-season format, although there could be some overlap between the end of Season 3 sports and the beginning of Season 4.
This news comes just weeks after the NJSIAA altered its plans for winter sports, where all competition was bumped back to 2021 and the wrestling season was pushed back to Season 3, which will run from March 1 to April 24.
The reinstatement of NJSIAA-sponsored state tournaments is a big change from its winter plans, where it scrapped state tournaments and deferred to leagues and conferences for postseason play. Some form of state-sponsored postseason tournaments were held in every fall sport, but dozens of teams were forced to drop out with COVID-19-related shut downs.
Pushing spring sports until the last weekend in June was an option considered by the NJSIAA last year in a last-ditch effort to preserve the season before it was ultimately canned in early May.
Brian Deakyne may be reached at bdeakyne@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @BrianDeakyne.
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After losing complete 2020 season, NJSIAA sets plan to resurrect spring HS sports - nj.com
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