The nationwide COVID-19 outbreak has had a big impact on this year’s seniors.

Back in late December, 2019 COVID-19 made its first appearance. By March 2020 it was starting to impact everyone’s daily lives. Most stores, schools, restaurants and businesses were shut down or going virtual. Little did the juniors know their senior year was going to be nothing like they had ever imagined it would be.

“My senior year has been cut short and most of the dances and sport seasons we would normally have, have either been canceled or cut short,” senior Mario Newell said.

Not only were sports impacted for the 2021 seniors by COVID, but other clubs and classes were as well. Summer baseball was canceled completely, football was moved to spring, and band students lost lots of opportunities to strut their stuff. 

“Unfortunately, we were unable to have a summer band which is where we would teach the freshman and other new members how to properly march so that we were ready to perform in parades,” senior student director Dani Johnson said. “We didn’t have homecoming, Oktoberfest, or a Cranfest parade, but we still worked hard as a band to learn and try new techniques.”

Some seniors were really looking forward to winter sports their senior year, but with COVID around, they knew it wasn’t going to be the same. Winter basketball players had some major curveballs to work around, including schedule changes, masks, and quarantines.

“Coming into my senior year, I wasn’t sure I’d even get to play basketball. But I was lucky enough to get one last season in,” senior Kobe Nichols said. “It was really weird having to wear masks during games and practices, but it wasn’t as bad as having to miss two weeks of our season from quarantine.” 

Although the class of 2021 knew of COVID before their senior year started, they had never expected to make some of the changes they did. Some seniors’ sports seasons were canceled, which allowed them to compete in a sport they had never given thought to or even had time to play.

“I played soccer when I was younger, but I never expected to play in high school just because it was the same time as football,” senior Mario Newell said. “Once I heard football had been moved to spring I realized I had nothing to do in the fall because COVID shut down my work and pushed back the football season, so I decided to take up soccer. I got in touch with a bunch of guys from the football team, and we were able to get around 10 guys from the football team to go out for soccer.”

Football players weren’t the only fall athletes who were given the opportunity to go out for soccer. Cross country athletes were also given the same opportunity, but it wasn’t quite as easy.

“My last cross country season had enough changes made to it that gave me the opportunity to double up on sports,” senior athlete Kobe Nichols said. “It was a busy schedule, but me and a couple other guys on the cross country team decided we were going to try playing both cross country and soccer all at the same time.”