To Play Or Not To Play?
BUTLER TWP — Soccer balls are being kicked, volleyballs are being bumped, tennis balls are being hit.
Football drills are being run. Cross country athletes are on the run.
It's business as usual — or unusual — for fall sports teams at Butler High School this month, though the fate of their seasons remains in limbo.
The PIAA will likely determine the fate of the prep fall sports season during a meeting Friday.
“Our open gyms were already delayed a month,” Butler volleyball senior Sophia Lucas said. “We were dying to get in here.
“Now we're just having fun. Whatever happens, happens.”
Lucas is the lone senior on Butler's volleyball team. Her mother, Meghan Lucas, is the Golden Tornado's coach.“If we don't play, we're still going to allow the kids to come in and practice, do drills among themselves,” Coach Lucas said. “AAU club teams have already said that if (high school) fall sports are canceled, they are going to immediately set up some fall tournaments.“When our girls first got back in the gym, seeing the looks on their faces when they got on the court with their friends for the first time ... It was priceless. Few people know what this means to these kids.“For some of these kids, this is their life. It motivates them for school. It has tremendous impact,” Lucas added.Butler junior volleyball player Taylor Welter says she “just works to push myself every day” rather than worry about the status of the season.“We want to play. We want to have our season,” she said. “We're going to prepare for it either way. Just being around your teammates motivates you.”Butler's football team has 58 players on the field each morning from Monday through Thursday, going through offensive and defensive drills without contact.Each player's temperature is taken and health questions asked daily before they can take the field or hit the weight room.“If we end up not playing, we will have wasted a lot of time,” junior tight end Charlie Kreinbucher said.Also a center in basketball, Kreinbucher has already had one season affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.“Whether we would have won the state championship or not, that was still a great experience,” he said of basketball. “We generated so much support from the community. It was memorable for everybody.“I'd love to see football have the opportunity to generate interest like that. Hopefully, whether it's fall or spring, we get the chance.”Butler's fall sports teams have abided by strict protocols put in place by the school district.“I give our district credit for that,” Coach Lucas said. “We've sanitized volleyballs during water breaks. Our players don't touch each other. We've observed every protocol since we started and have had no incidents.”The soccer teams take players' temperatures before every practice. The players answer three questions about their health every day as well.“These kids want to play. That's the bottom line,” Butler boys soccer coach Troy Mohney said. “We have 36 boys in the (soccer) program and 34 were here this (Monday) morning.“Not one parent has pulled a kid out. No kid has approached me about the virus situation. They're not afraid of it.”Butler senior running back-defensive back Steven Green said he takes it “one day at a time. There's no sense in looking beyond that.”All fall sports workouts continue to be voluntary. Mohney said he takes the players' temperatures each day.“Once practices become mandatory, the training staff will handle all of that,” he said.Mohney also runs a club soccer program. He said if fall high school sports are shut down, “we have additional coaches lined up and we'll set up a club schedule so these guys can play in the fall.“If fall sports are moved to the spring, it will create a juggling act between club soccer and the high school team. We'd have to figure it out. We have to, so these kids can play,” Mohney added.The boys soccer team does weight room work after weekday practices, which run from 7 to 9 a.m. Monday through Friday.The football team splits its numbers — some in the weight room, some on the practice field — to maintain protocol.“All we can do is come out and practice, work to get better,” senior running back-linebacker Justin Kabay said. “It's a mind-set thing.”Butler football coach Eric Christy said he is unsure how the season will look if teams are permitted to play.“I'm just hoping we have a season, any kind of season,” he said. “I want something for these kids and all the work they're putting in. Even if we have to have four intra-squad scrimmages on Thursday nights or something, we'll do that.“We may play some teams twice. Our game with Erie (Sept. 4) is currently a scrimmage. We need to get that changed because that's one of the few 6A games for both of us. We're supposed to play two Pittsburgh city schools. They weren't playing at first, now they want to play ... It's a mess.”Butler is already working on possibilities to allow the community to see the football games, though the state-mandated outdoor gathering of 250 people or fewer may still be in place.“The games may be live-streamed, we may set up pods of people at different places outside the stadium, show the game on the wall of a (school) building nearby, who knows what we'll do?,” Christy said. “I just hope we have a reason to figure all of that out.”
