BKW’s high- and moderate-risk sports postponed
Enterprise file photo — Michael Koff
Two Berne-Knox-Westerlo golfers haul their equipment across the green. Golf and cross-country are the only sports that will be played at BKW this fall. BKW Athletic Director Tom Galvin told The Enterprise that the district is moving forward only with the lowest-risk sports this fall in the face of the coronavirus; the Western Athletic Conference, of which BKW is a part, postponed high- and moderate-risk fall sports until March.
HILLTOWNS — Cross-country and golf are the only varsity sports that will be played at Berne-Knox-Westerlo this fall, as the Western Athletic Conference has postponed all high- and moderate-risk sports until the Fall Sports Season II, which begins March 1 and concludes at the end of April.
“Volleyball, football, and girls’ swimming will all be pushed to that March 1 start,” BKW Athletic Director Tom Galvin told The Enterprise last week.
Governor Andrew Cuomo released state guidelines around sports last month, categorizing sports as low, high, or moderate-risk based on the ability of players to keep distance and the amount of shared equipment, and whether or not that equipment can be sanitized between changing hands.
Sports have to be played within state-set parameters, Cuomo said, but it is up to individual districts to decide whether they practice and/or compete.
When asked about the difficulties of handling sports organization under the current coronavirus guidelines, Galvin said, “We haven’t started yet [but] we’re only doing golf and cross-country [this fall]. Because of the difficulties with the pandemic, we decided to only do the lowest risk sports. But we’ll make it work and keep our kids as safe as possible and give them the opportunity to participate in some sort of sporting event.”
