High School Seniors Cope With A Spring Without Sports Because Of Coronavirus

Ricardo Darius, a senior at Charlestown High School, poses for a photo outside his home in Boston’s Mattapan neighborhood on April 30, 2020. Darius ran track for the school since he was a freshman.
(Meredith Nierman/WGBH News)

The Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association officially shut down any hope of high school sports happening in the state this spring when its board of directors made the announcement a week ago that there would be no spring sports or tournaments.

That decision didn’t come as a shock for many. What really stung was Gov. Charlie Baker’s announcing just a few days earlier that school campuses would not reopen this academic year.

Baker acknowledged how much this would impact students, and especially seniors.

“They’ve all worked hard for four years and they look forward to the so-called last season. Whether it’s to play lacrosse, run track, participate in a school play, go to the prom, graduate,” Baker said when he made the announcement last week. “Because of COVID-19, a lot of this will not happen, and some of it will happen in ways that are far different than anybody would have imagined it just a few months ago.”

For senior athletes, their last season is something special. Like Paul Guiney, a pitcher and catcher at Catholic Memorial in West Roxbury, they’re having to deal with losing what they’ve pursued for so long.

Read the rest of this story at GBH’s website.