I've had this conversation more times than I can count in the past couple of weeks.
After a brief exchange of pleasantries with someone in the high school sports community, it evolves into this.
"What have you heard, what do you think is going to happen?"
"I don't know. What have you heard, what do you think is going to happen?"
As it turns out, we've all heard some stuff and none of us have any clue what's going to happen.
What we all know is practice for fall sports is scheduled to start Monday. Well, except for St. Louis city and county, where no public schools will be practicing. And the largest private school conference in St. Louis is holding off starting as well, according to the Post-Dispatch.
From there, it's just a few short weeks until games start at the end of the month, just like a normal year. But there's nothing normal about this year. And when competition starts, things on the field or the court will look pretty much the same, but the things behind the scenes won't.
We still don't know what those behind-the-scenes plans will be yet, but I think we have a pretty good clue from the school reopening plans. Which means it depends on the school, so it's clear as mud as there are different plans depending on the school.
On Saturday, the Mid-American Conference announced all fall sports will be moved to the spring, the first NCAA Division I conference to announce that decision. It wouldn't surprise me if some conferences will follow soon, they just didn't want to be the first.
What does that have to do with high school sports? Well, as one person involved in prep sports told me, if they move fall sports to spring in college, there's going to be a lot of pressure to do that in high school.
Does that domino fall in the next week or two?
Practices will start Monday, we know that for sure. And if things go right, competitions will start at the end of the month. But for how long?
Please understand, nobody wants high school sports to be played this fall more than those of us in the pod of sports desks at the News Tribune. We like each other, but goodness, the chance to get out of the office to cover actual games on a nightly basis has us raring to go. We're a good-looking group, don't get me wrong, but new faces in new places would be great.
So what do I think, what have I heard? Masks, no masks? Temperature checks, no temperature checks? Fans allowed, limited fans allowed, no fans allowed? Schools will follow the green, yellow and red directions of the county health department at a minimum. But remember, individual schools can make their own decisions and it won't be the same at every one.
If the school has students wearing masks in the school, you should expect to wear one at an inside activity. I would also guess there will be pre-game temperature checks not only for the athletes, but the fans as they enter, inside or outside. And I would expect limited fans, perhaps only admitting people with tickets from players participating to limit attendance and promote social distancing. Which would make the Jefferson City-Helias-Capital City football meetings in three straight weeks from Sept. 25-Oct. 9 all at Adkins Stadium some very valuable tickets to acquire.
COVID-19 has already hit a couple of sports in this city, we've heard there have been cases at some schools in the Mid-Missouri area as well. And as Cardinals fans know, a case or two or 13 can derail a season. It won't take 13 at the high school level for that to happen.
This is not a normal year. There's no reason to think the high school sports season will be any different.