Commissioner frustrated message supporting return of sports not always getting out

CIF Southern Section Commissioner Rob Wigod made it clear Tuesday that the section continues to back the return of high school sports when safe and expressed frustration that the message doesn’t always accurately get out to the public.

Wigod made his comments in response to a question during a press conference on Zoom with sports reporters, four hours after the CIF announced that post-season competition for the fall sports is being cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The regular seasons and league contests can still be held if state, county and local officials allow and if Southern California is out of the current stay at home orders.

“I am extremely frustrated by what I have seen,” Wigod said of the reaction to how the CIF is handling the possible return of high school sports. “Some of it really is hard. If anyone thinks for one second that the CIF Southern Section does not want student athletes to be out particpating in education based athletics, they are absolutely 100 percent wrong.

“What we have said since March, when this shut down began, is the same thing that we are saying today. This is an individual school, school district and private school decision on whether student athletes can resume to play high athletics following the guidelines of the California Department of Public Health and local health authorities.

“It is not the CIF’s guidelines, it is the California Department of Public Health’s guidelines and our schools were reminded of that today. I wish people would understand it is that dynamic. That is the scenario and it’s been that way since March and I’ve written about it many, many times and I’ve stated it many, many times and for some reason that message doesn’t always get through to people.

“That has been disappointing because if there is anyone at this moment who believe we are benefiting from this ….. I’ve already explained what it means to us financially, the future of this organization ….”

Also Tuesday:

—-Wigod said the financial affect of losing revenue from the CIF fall championship events is significant which will likely result in continued cutbacks in the section and less revenue being returned to member schools.

“There are major, major implications for us financially,” he said.

—-CIF officials are continuing to talk with officials with the California Department of Public Health about the tiers that are required for sports to happen. But those tiers have not changed, Wigod said.

Sports allowed in the most restrictive purple tier are cross country, golf, skiing/snowboarding, swimming and diving, tennis and track and field but the local stay at home orders would have to be lifted for those sports to happen.

—Baseball and softball are scheduled to start on March 19. Both sports are currently in the red substantial tier, so counties would have to be at that level for the sports to happen. In addition, Wigod said there are some questions about travel and whether teams can travel from one county to another.

“That is two months from today,” Wigod said. “Hopefully we are making progress towards that time and we can get close to that happening. If it doesn’t happen on March 19, or soon after. Once that happens, we have to see how it develops among our seven counties to know what we’re dealing with again, going back to league play. League play is a necessary component and element of any championship competition we can host, so we will have to see this all play out in the time ahead.”

—CIF officials have considered extending the football season from April 17 to the end of April.

“There have been discussions about extending that into the end of April to April 30; we haven’t quite gotten to that discussion point yet,” Wigod said. “Perhaps at the time that football can resume, hopefully if it does resume in this fall season, we can have that discussion and maybe consider a couple more weeks for the ability for schools to play, but I don’t want to commit to that today because I don’t even know when we’re going to actually start.”

-Tim Burt, OC Sports Zone; timburt@ocsportszone.com