Over the weekend, Illinois Governor JB Pritzker lowered two Covid-19 Regions in Illinois from Tier 3 Mitigations all the way down to Teir 1 Mitigations. That movement allows those specific regions to play low-risk interscholastic sports and activites such as bowling and swimming and diving against schools inside your region. One of those two regions- Region 2- that have met the criteria, make up the counties in our immediate listening area, including, but not limited to, Warren, Knox, Henderson, Mercer, McDonough and Fulton. There’s at least one Warren County school that is very excited about the prospect of playing winter sports. The Abingdon-Avon bowling program has a long history of success and normally has around 20-25 students taking part each winter. A-Town AD Reid Kelso says the Tornado bowling program was ready to go before Thanksgiving, but shortly after the holiday, the IHSA shut down all sports across the state. As of this weekend, bowling has been given the go-ahead to start competing again. Kelso says it would be difficult to get going within a few days, but not much longer than that.
As for high school basketball and football being played this school year, Kelso is not nearly as optimistic. Even though things are heading in the right direction as far as the pandemic goes in a few regions around the state, those two sports are still considered high-risk activities and would need to drop dramatically, and quickly, to be played. There are many hurdles that would have to be jumped before getting on the court, or the football field.
For the entire interview with Kelso, go to our website 977wmoi.com and look in the Sports Podcast section.
