Kean reacts to the suspension of sports across the world amid Coronavirus crisis
By Harold Carias | Published by March 26, 2020
The rapid spread of COVID-19 (Coronavirus) has left fans and athletes of professional and amateur sports leagues in wonder of when one of our sources of entertainment will return.
On March 11, the World Health Organization declared the rapidly spreading COVID-19 outbreak a pandemic.
In response to concerns about COVID-19, Kean Athletics announced that spring sports would not be traveling to Florida and California as the Baseball, Softball, and Lacrosse teams had planned for spring break.
“I have a few friends on the Women’s Lacrosse Team and they worked so hard this off season,” said sophomore health and physical education major John Morales. “For this trip to be canceled, a lot of opportunities were taken away from them due to the virus and they didn’t even know they had played their last game. It just sucks.”
One feels empathy for all our Kean senior student-athletes who have worked hard during this winter off season to prepare for the sports they love.
“I would be devastated and heartbroken,” said senior psychology major and Women’s soccer player Lexy Monroy. “Even though I already had my last game, you spend so many hours training and then it ends unexpectedly. It’s probably the worst feeling an athlete can feel.”
Across the United States, schools of higher learning under the NCAA have decided to forgo in-person classes and instead move to remote learning. The decisions of the individual institutions to ask their students to stay at home and to not come back until further notice had to also impact the prize possession of the NCAA, March Madness.
On March 12, the NCAA announced the cancellation of the Men’s and Women’s Basketball Tournaments and all other winter and spring sports.
“There’s no March Madness! I am really missing it,” said senior Athletic Training major Kenia Flores. “But for Kean, it’s sad because we’re missing our home games and as a student trainer, we can’t help the injured athletes due to the quarantine.”
There are many issues that COVID-19 has brought upon the lives of Kean students and for the moment we are all coping.
While spring break was spent back home, students didn’t expect to have an additional two weeks to transition to online learning. In homes, it is inevitable to turn on the t.v., phone, or tablet and the absence of sports entertainment is glaring for students.
In a span of 72 hours, all major sports leagues across the United States and the world announced suspensions or postponements of their products. The NBA led the charge in the United States with announcing its suspension hours after a player from the Utah Jazz tested positive for COVID-19.
“I thought it was crazy how they decided to suspend the NBA season,” said junior computational science and engineering major Khanjan Patel. “I understand why they suspended the season and I hope all the employees who work at the arenas are paid because that hourly wage is what they depend on.”
Along with Patel, Rodriguez also had the same sentiment about the suspensions across the leagues.
“I was surprised that the NBA announced its suspension but it made sense after Rudy Gobert tested positive for the Coronavirus,” said junior communications major Jose Rodriguez. “For baseball, they shut down all of spring training and opening day is now in question for May.”