PIAA spring sports, winter championships canceled as Gov. Wolf closes schools for remainder of academic year

Pennsylvania’s governing body over high school sports has made its decision. The PIAA has canceled the 2020 winter championships and spring sports season.

The governing body announced the decision Thursday afternoon with a press release after the championships and season were suspended for nearly a month.

“Today’s decision by the PIAA Board of Directors was difficult for everyone,” PIAA Executive Director Dr. Robert Lombardi said in the release. “Their thoughts remain on the thousands of student-athletes, coaches, officials, and family members affected by this decision.

“However, the board’s position reflects a steadfast priority of keeping our student-athletes, officials and member schools’ staff and their communities safe while following the guidelines provided by the governor, the Department of Health and the Department of Education.”

The decision comes just hours after Gov. Tom Wolf announced schools across the state will not reopen for the 2019-20 academic year.

“While this was a critical step for us to take to protect as many people as possible, it was not an easy decision to make,” Gov. Tom Wolf said.

The remaining winter championships — girls’ and boy’s basketball and Class 2A swimming — were originally postponed March 12, while some swimmers, including some from Penns Valley, were already at Bucknell University ready to compete. The spring sports season was postponed a few days later when Wolf initially closed schools for to weeks.

On April 1, Penns Valley Swimming and Diving head coach Steve Duck said his seniors had already begun to lose hope after believing they’d get an opportunity to finish out their senior year.

“The girls that are seniors really wanted to go out with this for their senior year,” he said. “I think at first they thought maybe it would happen.”

Philipsburg-Osceola head baseball coach Doug Sankey said the program couldn’t run without school in session, saying his program was shut down as long as the school was shut down, but that didn’t change his empathy for his players.

“I still feel bad for the kids,” Sankey said in March. “You see thousands of kids across all sports losing their senior years. I feel bad for those kids. To lose your senior year, I can’t imagine that.”