Student sections looked much different a year ago to now. On the left is Warsaw’s volleyball support in September 2021 versus football support in October 2020. InkFreeNews photos by Mike Deak and Dalton Tinklenberg

By Mike Deak
InkFreeNews

WARSAW – I realized around Thursday of last week that the subject matter to what would eventually construct this column idea I was given had gone from stats, facts and opinions to, in the days since, first-person perspective. Let’s dig into a full year of live sports and how 2021 looks compared to a year ago.

When one is forced to stay home for a mandatory 10-14 days in as what one of my co-workers called the “Quarantine Dome”, there’s a lot of shifting and moving parts that have to be attended to very quickly. Much was made of this time frame a year ago in athletics, as it was like reading going-out-of-business notices to your favorite stores in the fall of 2020 when programs like Goshen football was missing two weeks early on over one JV player, and later on Concord football was canceled right before its sectional that voided its postseason, or Hammond Clark boys soccer right before the regional, which gave NorthWood a bye into the regional final, and possibly the fresher legs helped the Panthers to a title that night.

NorthWood volleyball also had pauses in its 2020 campaign, and unfortunately, right before its huge matchup with Warsaw that was to determine the NLC frontrunner heading into the final week of the regular season.

Warsaw athletic director Matt Binkerd looks on at a 2020 golf match at Stonehenge.

“One of the things we encouraged them to do last year was to work on their own, it’s really the only option we had,” said NorthWood’s Mark Heeter. “We had several kids traced out of that volleyball game with Warsaw, but we didn’t know if we would have them back for the sectional. It made preparation hard, but it’s also hard on the kids because they’re not in rhythm.”

Heeter, an assistant for Hilary Laidig’s volleyball program, would find that out in more surrealistic regard in his first year as the girls basketball coach for the Panthers. A crippling four separate team shutdowns for COVID protocols really took out the Black Swish at the knees as the defending state champs really weren’t able to generate any real momentum in what Heeter noted was a ‘miserable’ year.

“After going through a year like that, I think the girls would be better able to adapt to changes if we have to make them,” Heeter said. “What got us out twice last year was someone on the other team, so the game we played, anyone who got in, they got close contacted.”

The pressure of the new in 2020, where the media loved to use words like “unprecedented” and “uncertain” and “fear,” doing what felt right in the moment was incredibly easy to do, even if it wasn’t met with the same favor from the outside. Elkhart County’s health department did that in August of 2020, pulling all athletics off the table to begin its season, and easing back in to the chagrin and jealousy of those around who started on time. Gyms were virtually empty for volleyball and later basketball, some places like McCuen Gym at Concord and the Tiger Den at Warsaw eerily quiet as opposing players shot free throws in the fourth quarter of close games. The sights of fanless swim sectionals were almost insulting to the senses.

“In the early onset, it was let’s err on the side of caution,” said NorthWood athletic director Roman Smith, who was an assistant AD at Warsaw last year. “If you got contact traced, it was let’s get you out of here and quarantine for 10-14 days and check your symptoms. Check in with you and your family. That was really big for us to stay ahead of it. This year, we still have a similar system, going through the processes, but it’s now a little more backed by data.”

The spring of 2021 actually saw more of a relaxed atmosphere at the outdoor sports, and cases around the state reflected the change from barren state of consumption to a more thriving atmosphere of entertainment. As fall 2021 got underway, sporting environments have seemed to come back to what we remembered in 2019, or perhaps, even better. Volleyball games had full student sections, football games were themed again, JV teams were able to sit with their varsity programs at soccer again. Kinda how it should be, right?

Some adaptations from the 2020 seasons carried over to 2021, including volleyball not changing sides after each game and no postgame handshakes.

“Last year all 17 varsity programs dealt with some kind of scheduling change or shutdown during the season due to COVID,” offered Grace College athletic director Chad Briscoe. “This year through the fall nine sports competing, only four programs have had scheduling changes. We have not had any teams shut down this fall thus far this season due to COVID.”

“The biggest victory that we have seen is the resiliency of our athletes,” said Wawasee athletic director Brent Doty. “They do not miss a step when something unforeseen happens to them or their teammates. Oftentimes, these scenarios are out of their control, but they are resilient and find the best in every situation. In my opinion this will benefit them immensely as they leave Wawasee High School and enter into their community or transition to college…and isn’t that what education-based athletics is all about? Providing opportunities for student-athletes to thrive, so they are prepared for the next step in their adult lives.”

That was also echoed by Tippecanoe Valley athletic director Aaron Butcher, who like Doty, jumped into athletic direction as a rookie in 2020 and learned quickly that there was no handbook on what was in front of them.

“Last year was certainly a unique time,” noted Butcher. “You often hear the saying “sink or swim”, but I think taking over this job after the school year had started during a pandemic was certainly one of those situations. There was no easing into things. It was jump in and start swimming. The AD’s in the Three Rivers Conference are great and provided a lot of help when I had questions. I also have a good assistant in Emily Gearhart which helped with the transition. I think if anything last year facilitated more discussion with AD’s that maybe you wouldn’t be dealing with normally because oftentimes you were seeing who had games available. This led to some matchups that you normally wouldn’t see in a regular season.”

So where are we at now? Well, for me, I am in my living room of my “Dome” enjoying an apple crisp our friend brought over for us to enjoy as my family rides out our seventh day of quarantine for COVID. I can’t really taste it, but my senses tell me it’s something sweet and I should enjoy it! My wife’s symptoms are far worse than anything I’ve had, but she’s far better than West Noble AD Tom Schermerhorn was last March into April. My oldest daughter just lost her taste and smell but never got sick, my youngest daughter didn’t experience any sickness.

It’s almost ironic, fitting and telling all in one on how COVID has affected us in general. My wife’s business has come to almost a halt while I’ve been able to work from home. Some schools, they are able to lose just one or two players for a week and carry on, others, like Rochester football, lost a Bell Game. Wawasee soccer trudged on this fall, but coach Jordan Sharp often noted his team was playing shorthanded, COVID often tossed into that explanation.

Moral of the story – we’re getting smarter. COVID isn’t going away anytime soon, we just learn to live with it, as we do with regular flu, and seasonal allergies and the like. 2020 showed that athletics can adapt, and even thrive, in the right circumstances. We just have to rally together when the times are tough and remember why we’re out here in the first place.

It’s to be seen if we’ll get to this point in 2021 where fan attendance was limited to just parents of athletes at contests, which made for a much different tournament atmosphere at spectator-friendly venues like the Elkhart Aquatic Center.