This COVID-19 season has been a bizarre experience for most sports team, but the most prominent uncertainty is in competition cancellations.
California Baptist University’s swimming team has had six cancelled meets this season, not counting ones pushed back or postponed. Most of those meets were scheduled for the fall season.
“It’s a completely different season,” said Rick Rowland, head coach of men and women swimming and diving. “Traditionally we have a couple of invitational meets in the fall which were canceled. We also traditionally compete against California State University Bakersfield, but they decided to cancel their whole season.”
The swim team only started competing last December, despite having started training in October.
Christian Meyer, junior sports psychology major and long-distance swimmer, said the meets that they usually have provided the kind of training that they needed to improve upon and that having their mid-season meet cancelled changed how the team trained.
“Usually we would back off on practice intensity for some meet. Instead, this year, we would go hard all the way,” Meyer said.
Rowland said the key to facing uncertainties is to keep the team in the loop and maintain a positive tone.
“We hold team meetings every day to keep the team ready for what’s to come,” Rowland said.
Having scheduled meetings keeps the team prepared for sudden changes.
“Having meets suddenly canceled does not bother me too much because we kept preparing for different scenarios,” Meyer said. “Although it is a bummer that I have my mind already in race mode and then have them suddenly canceled.”
The women’s basketball team has also had problems with canceled matches. Despite that, the women went strong and performed one of the best seasons in the history of the program.
Jarrod Olson, head coach of women’s basketball, gives all the credit to the players for being adaptable to the situation, which brings the promise of accomplishing the team’s season goal.
“Our goal is to win the WAC (Western Athletic Conference) regular-season championship, The WAC tournament and also qualify for a postseason tournament,” Olson said.
Olson and the women’s basketball team accomplished their first goal last weekend when they won the WAC championship with their 20th win in the season.
The women’s swimming team finished its season Feb. 20 in fifth ,with Isabella Rhodes, senior civil engineering major and IM swimmer, finishing first in the 200-yard individual medley.
