High school spring sports has official come to an end.
The Midsouth Association of Independent Schools (MAIS) announced early last Wednesday morning that it has canceled all remaining spring sports activities.
The vote was made on a Tuesday, April 28 teleconference meeting.
The MAIS made the announcement on Twitter in a 2 a.m. tweet that read “The MAIS Athletics and Activities Commission has canceled all remaining championship events for the 2019-20 school year because of the COVID-19 economic shutdown. Nevertheless, it reminds member schools that as local orders permit, teams may practice and scrimmage, as well as compete against each other as per normal summer guidelines.”
The MAIS had been holding out hope to be able to play some spring sports. There were at least three alternate plans in place to play a baseball season, which had the most interest in continuing playing.
Winona Christian athletics director Junior Graham said he hated to see it come to an end.
“Obviously, you feel for those seniors and those teams that felt like they had a special chance to compete for a state championship,” Graham said. “But at some point, it’s time to move on and try to get a summer that resembles something normal and move forward into the next school year. Mississippi is a big baseball state but then you have those sports like track, tennis and golf and those guys didn’t get a chance to play for something special. But it is what it is. I’m just glad the decision is made and we can start to structure some summer for these athletes.”
Carroll Academy AD Tommy Acy said it was a chance to reboot on some things.
“Sometimes you have to let go of the past and just start over and that’s what we are doing,” Acy said. “As for the seniors, I hate it. We had a couple of kids that all they did was play a spring sport. When you don’t get a chance to play the one thing you do, that stinks for them. It’s bad for those kids that only play in the spring because they don’t get to do the one thing they work for all year long.”
The Mississippi High School Activities Association had previously voted to cancel spring sports last week.
