Athletic directors adapting to pandemic

By JEREMY SELLEW

jsellew@yourmvi.com

While the COVID-19 pandemic has wreaked havoc on high school sports this spring, local athletic administrators are still busy as ever.

Not to mention some are either serving as teachers and trying to navigate through online and distance learning activities with their students. They’re still trying to perform their duties overseeing their athletic departments.

“Probably the most challenging part of the pandemic is not knowing what is going to happen and the uncertainty of how things will look in the fall and next school year,” Monessen athletic director Gina Naccarato said. “Right now we’re preparing for a regular fall season, but things may have to be modified day to day or week to week.”

Naccarato, who is also the assistant principal at Monessen Elementary Center, said the most important part is ensuring the safety of students and staff.

“Each day you are reading guidelines and recommendations and different scenarios are going through your head of what we will need to do to keep everyone safe,” she said. “These are definitely uncharted waters we are facing and we have to take it day by day. 

“This is really difficult for ADs because we look at everything so far in advance when dealing with athletics.”

Since the cancellation of this year’s spring sports, athletic directors have received the new basketball alignments and schedules as well as the new spring sports alignments and schedules.

“Right now all the schedules are completed for the 2020-21 season, but we all know that this could change at any point. All of us have scheduled the maximum number of games for each sport,” Naccarato added.

Another thing the athletic directors are responsible for is making sure eligibility requirements are met for the upcoming fall season. Grades are tabulated now, which can be difficult with off-site learning taking place everywhere.

“The most challenging thing has been keeping in contact with all of our student athletes and working with them to keep up with their coursework,” Clairton AD Ted Ulmer said. “I’ve worked in close contact with our high school principal, Dr. John Wilkinson, as well as our head coaches to keep an eye on our kids. We’ve all made a lot of phone calls and emails.”

To read the rest of this story, please see a copy of Friday’s Mon Valley Independent, call 724-314-0035 to subscribe or subscribe to our online edition at https://e.monvalleyindependent.com.