As the majority of SVHS sports restart after a year-long hiatus, boys’ soccer and waterpolo have been canceled for the season. A lack of substantial interest and conflicts with other sports are the primary causes of these two cancellations.

   Senior Alvaro Oseguera, who had planned on playing his third year on varsity boys’ soccer this spring, regretfully states that he was “looking forward to playing his last season with the boys,” and is admittedly “frustrated that it isn’t happening.”

   Under normal circumstances, SVHS sports are split into three seasons: fall, winter, and spring. Teams like the football team kick off the school sports season in the autumn, which is then followed by soccer, basketball, and others in the winter. The remaining teams compete in the spring, with a total of 18 sports. This format ensures that students face little conflict when choosing a sport for each season.

   However, this format was halted as school sports skidded to a halt in March of 2020 when the COVID-19 virus broke out on a global scale. For a whole year, sports were put on hold, until a decrease in COVID-19 cases in Sonoma County meant that school sports teams were given the green light to begin for the 2020-2021 school year.

   With only three months of the school year remaining at the time of restart in March, coaches and organizers scrambled to schedule their sports. Even with shortened seasons, there has been a substantial amount of overlap between sports that would normally be separated into different times of the year. 

   Grant Boydell, sophomore and avid basketball and baseball player, though it was a “tough experience having to choose between sports,” because he usually “does two, both of which [he] loves.” He ultimately chose basketball, and reflects that “he thinks he made the right decision,” but agrees that having to choose is just “another way that COVID-19 affects our lives.”

   Some players, however, didn’t even have the choice to play the sport they love. Boys’ soccer and water polo players, especially seniors in their final eligible year to play high school sports, are left to rue what could’ve been.

   Jack Turner, a senior, loves “to start off the school year with a challenge with water polo, ” and agrees that “it was disappointing that the season was pushed back because of COVID-19 and ultimately didn’t happen.”