If you watch sports enough, you hear it all the time: The best coaches are the ones who can make adjustments. Halftime adjustments. Mid-season adjustments. Roster adjustments following injuries.
Being a coach requires constant adaptation. And perhaps no academic year required more of it than the one that just ended on June 19. When California’s governor and state health officials finally relaxed guidelines enough for outdoor sports in late February, it triggered a domino effect that eventually led to every high school sport having some sort of abbreviated season squeezed into a 16-week window.
Many coaches who had resigned themselves to losing a whole year, suddenly faced an accelerated timeline that would include limited practice time, a variety of testing protocols and anxiety, and a long list of other unknowns outside of their control. The pandemic year’s impact on young athletes has been well documented, but coaches were deeply affected as well.
For this episode, we asked four coaches to share their experiences of being a coach during an unprecedented time, including one that shares a scenario that would’ve been tough to navigate during a normal year.
Join us as we highlight the men and women who willingly jumped in the foxhole to make sure kids could be kids again.
GUESTS:
Tom Costello, Head Boys Basketball Coach, Dublin High
David Perry, Head Football Coach, Bishop O'Dowd High (Oakland)
Nick Wisely, Head Softball and Golf Coach, Antioch High
Kevin Macy, Head Football Coach, Campolindo High (Moraga)
