Alaska has canceled its fall high school state championship events, including swimming & diving. Meanwhile, New Jersey has set new dates for its winter seasons.
The Alaska School Activities Association (ASAA) announced this week that it would be canceling all 2020 fall sport state championship events. In Alaska, fall sports and activities include swimming & diving, football, volleyball, rifle, music, esports, and DDF (drama, debate & forensics).
The cancellation of the state swimming & diving meet comes in the midst of the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Alaska also announced the postponement of all other activities, with the state planning to adopt a revised activities calendar in the future.
Alaska has seen a spike in new coronavirus cases this month, even as the state’s per-population death rate remains low relative to other states in the U.S. The Anchorage Daily News reports that four people in Alaska died Wednesday with COVID-19, and the state saw 144 new cases today.
New Jersey, meanwhile, has announced official postseason dates for winter sports, which includes swimming & diving in that state. Back in August, New Jersey announced a plan to split the traditional three seasons of high school sports into four shortened seasons amid the pandemic. That plan had swimming beginning on December 3 with no state meet at the end of the year.
New Jersey will stick with that December 3 start date according to an announcement this week. But the state also revealed some more key dates:
- Winter season starts: December 3
- Competition can begin: December 21
- Regular-season competition ends: February 3
- Postseason competition: February 5-17
New Jersey has seen a rise in COVID cases this October, from about 300-600 a day for most of November to 500-1300 a day so far in October. But the state is also well below its peak in March, when the state was routinely seeing 3,000 or more new cases a day.
Worth remembering is that NJ HS swimming is quirky. Team champions are crowned via dual meet brackets. Which appears might actually happen, depending on circumstances. Individual champs are crowned via the “state meet” where no team scores are kept.. Which, per the August announcement, will not happen this year.