District cancels sporting events for the remainder of the month

The Mat-Su Borough School District announced Sunday that all intradistrict indoor sports and activities have been suspended until Oct. 31.

“Our primary focus has been to keep at-school learning open for students, but due to the Mat-Su Borough moving into the ‘high risk’ COVID alert level and in increase in the number of positive cases in our schools, the MSBSD Health Advisory Team is postponing all indoor, intradistrict competition,” district officials said in a press release.

At the high school level, this impacts sports such as volleyball and swimming and diving. Earlier this month, the Alaska Schools Activities Association canceled all fall state championship events. ASAA did allow competition within a region or district until Nov. 22. MSBSD’s decision supersedes ASAA’s call.

ASAA also postponed the start of all winter sports, including hockey, wrestling, Nordic skiing and basketball. The ASAA Board of Directors are set to meet again Nov. 9.

The district’s move to suspend athletics impacts six varsity volleyball matches scheduled for Oct. 22, Oct. 27 and Oct. 29, and a swim meet on Oct. 30. The Wasilla Invitational swimming and diving meet slated for Oct. 17 was postponed and will also not go as planned. All of those events will not be rescheduled, according to the district.

The Mat-Su’s fall intradistrict schedule does include regular season volleyball matches on Nov. 5, and a tournament at Wasilla High School Nov. 13-14. There is also a swim meet scheduled for Nov. 14. The district left open the possibility for those seasons to be completed, and will re-evaluate and release a final decision by Oct. 30.

There was also a senior all-star football game scheduled for Friday at Colony High, but that game was canceled on Monday.

Prior to the start of the 2020-2021 school year, the district restricted high school athletics to only competition within the school district. Athletes in cross-country running, tennis and football were able to face competition from outside the district on Oct. 10. Valley athletes competed in the ASAA state cross-country running championships and ASAA state tennis championships in Anchorage on Oct,. 10. The Houston football team played at Nikiski and the Redington squad played at Valdez in the ASAA Division I quarterfinals also on Oct. 10. ASAA made its announcement regarding the cancellation of the remainder of the fall championship events and the postponement of winter events on Oct. 13.

The Mat-Su Borough recently moved into the state’s high risk COVID-19 category. As of Monday evening, there were 177 new coronavirus cases reported in the borough within the last 14 days and 60 within the last three. There has also been a rise in cases within Valley schools. The district announced Monday evening that Colony High, Wasilla High and Mat-Su Career and Technical High would be closed to in-class learning for the remainder of the week. Eight different schools — Colony High, Wasilla High, Career and Tech, Mat-Su Central, Houston Jr./Sr. High, Big Lake Elementary, Sherrod Elementary and Fronteras Charter — were closed on Tuesday.

Contact Frontiersman managing editor Jeremiah Bartz at editor@frontiersman.com.