As the first semester is wrapping up and winter break is coming, winter sports face the dilemma of going home in the middle or at the very start of their season.
This winter break the winter sports Cheer, Track & Field, Men’s and Women’s basketball, and Swim and Dive are all affected by the mid-season break.
Each team has their own way of handling it, and the coaches were able to give their insights so that KSC’s athletes can come back still in top performance shape.
Men’s basketball
David Hastings, the men’s basketball coach explained, “We’ll have the guys go home for Christmas, they come back around the 28th, we’ll practice daily, sometimes a couple times a day based on getting them back in basketball shape, they’ll be at home for almost two weeks, we’ll open up again on January third against Castleton. A conference game when we come back Jan 3d, and through the whole break it will be all conference games.”
According to Hastings, last season wasn’t that much different, but last year they came back one day earlier. “I think five days is enough to get back and get ready to play again,” he said.
Women’s basketball
Women’s basketball is going to be gone for nearly two weeks, and will come back on the 26th. “We’re doing something a little bit different this year,” said Women’s basketball coach,Keith Boucher, he said. ““They’re going to have a program that they’re going to do when they’re home, now are all of them going to do it? I’d like to tell you it’s going to be 100% participation, but probably not, I hope it is.”
Boucher explained that this year he is implementing a contract that his team will sign saying that they will do the workouts. “You are more likely to do something when you sign off on it, so they’re going to have a buddy, it’s going to be a buddy system, and they’re each going to sign the contract,” he said. “This is going to be a daily planner for them, and if you don’t follow through what are the consequences? Now the consequence is that you’re not going to get better, but your team is going to get better.”
Women’s basketball will play their next game at Suffolk on Dec. 29th.
Track and field
Dan Roarke, head coach of the Track and Field team and the cross country team will not have his athletes come back until January 2. “Right now they have workouts of their own, everyone has assigned workouts, each group, the sprints, jumps, throws, and distance runners will continue to stay in shape over the winter holiday, workouts on their own, we’ll come back january second and then get right into it with our first meet of the new year on January 6th,” Roarke said. He explained that it’s the runners’ responsibility to stay in shape over the holiday, and complete the workouts assigned.
Swim
Ksc’s Swim and Dive team will also be coming back on Jan. 2, but this is after training a week in Florida. When they come back, Swim Coach Christopher Woolridge said, “We usually give them a couple days off in the backend Martin Luther King day, when we’re here, we have two weeks of on-campus training so we’ll bring the whole team back, Swimmers will be going twice a day they’ll be doing a morning and an afternoon workout with their weights mixed into that, divers will be on the board once a day, with their weight and dryland mixed into that, it’ll be a different schedule.”
Along with that, Wooldridge explained that when the swimmers were not working out, he will try to incorporate team activities with the other teams on campus. “we’ll try and catch some at home basketball games, I think I’m going to get with Dan [Roarke] and try and do a couple of inter team activities and try and keep it interesting for everybody, they’re working hard, they’re tired, try and interject a little bit of fun in that process” he said.
Cheer did not respond for comment.
Molly Lu McKellar can be contacted
at mmckellar@kscequinox.com
