High School Football Season 'No Longer a Viable Option': CIAC

CONNECTICUT — Hopes of at least an abbreviated high school football season in Connecticut were dashed Friday morning as the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference (CIAC) announced its Board of Control, after consultation with the state Department of Public Health (DPH), deemed full-contact football "no longer a viable option."

On Thursday, the DPH "suggested that CIAC consider modifications to higher risk activities, and we continue to encourage such modifications. Absent such modifications, DPH is unlikely to support higher risk activities for the Fall term." Among the options suggested by the DPH was seven-versus-seven football, which it placed in the moderate-risk category.

CIAC executive director Glenn Lungarini said, "The CIAC feels it has exhausted all possible scenarios in seeking DPH support for a full contact football experience this fall."

A statement from the CIAC reads, "Without DPH support, the CIAC cannot move forward with a full contact season as it would place superintendents and boards of education in the impossible position of acting against the recommendation of a state agency ... In alignment with DPH’s encouragement to consider modifications to higher risk activities, the CIAC will collaborate with athletic directors, coaches, and medical experts to provide football players with meaningful low to moderate risk fall activities."

The Board of Control on Friday also mandated the wearing of masks during girls volleyball, an indoor sport played during the fall.

"In alignment with DPH’s recommendation to consult its sports medicine committee, the CIAC and its medical experts believe that the modification of wearing masks mitigates the risk expressed by DPH and provides a safe indoor environment for the sport of volleyball," the CIAC statement read.

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