By Maurice Patton
Girls basketball at both Spring Hill and Santa Fe has been put on pause for a couple of weeks because of COVID-19 concerns.
Both teams have experienced recent positive tests within their ranks, forcing them to quarantine – Santa Fe until Dec. 14, Spring Hill until Dec. 15.
The shutdown will force Spring Hill’s girls to miss upcoming road contests against Brentwood (Dec. 8), Giles Co. (Dec. 10) and a Dec. 11 game against visiting Ravenwood. The doubleheader Friday against visiting Summit – like Brentwood and Ravenwood, a District 11-AAA matchup – had already been postponed for Summit’s appearance in this weekend’s BlueCross Bowl football state championships.
“We were supposed to play Dickson County on Tuesday,” Spring Hill athletics director John Farmer said, recounting the events leading up to the announcement. “We’d planned to go ahead with the boys game, but Dickson County didn’t want to bring a bus for their boys and bring one later for their girls.
“With our other district games – per (district) bylaws, we are playing the boys games and the girls games will have to be played later. So the boys will play Brentwood and Ravenwood, and the girls will have to reschedule. (As for) Giles County, we’re still up in the air about what we’re going to do about that.”
The next scheduled doubleheader for Spring Hill is currently set for Dec. 17 against visiting Hickman County.
Santa Fe girls coach Jonathon Slaughter has tested positive for COVID-19.
“I started feeling sick Sunday night, woke up (Monday) with a fever, got tested and got my results (Wednesday),” he said. “I’m under quarantine for 10 days. We had practice Sunday with the high school girls, so that led them to have to quarantine for close contact for 10 days.
Santa Fe had been scheduled to play Tuesday against visiting East Hickman, but that doubleheader was canceled after Hickman County Schools were unable to travel because of inclement weather. Santa Fe will miss its Friday twinbill at Cornersville. The boys are expected to play Dec. 8 at McEwen and Dec. 11 at Collinwood.
The Lady Wildcats are scheduled to resume practice on Dec. 14 and play Dec. 15 against visiting Jo Byrns.
“I’ve had a low-grade fever,” Slaughter said. “The highest it’s been was 101 (degrees). I’ve got general achiness, a runny nose, a cough. I don’t feel good, but I don’t feel like I’m about to die. I don’t know that I’ve got the bad part of it.”
Chris Poynter, athletics director for Maury County Public Schools, said there’s no heightened concern over the current athletic quarantines.
“We’re concerned, but we’ve tried to put in precautionary measures,” he said. “Right now, our process is actually doing what it’s supposed to do. We’re notified of individuals who have tested positive, identified those who have been potentially exposed, and those players and/or coaches have been quarantined. It’s designed to do that.
“Our goal has been to try, in the safest way possible, to have athletics continue, just as we have since the beginning of the school year. Our coaches and ADs have done an outstanding job to try to minimize the impact … Some things are just unavoidable.”
Maurice Patton is the editor for Southern Middle Tennessee Sports. E-mail: mopattonsports@gmail.com; Twitter: @mopatton_sports.