With the NBA finals recently coming to a close many months after they were originally scheduled to be played, many sports fans are thinking back to the earlier months of 2020 when there were no live sports to watch due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

Although COVID is still a major part of our lives, live sports have finally made their return as we are currently in the middle of the NFL season and MLB postseason. This has brought relief to many DBHS students who were forced to suffer for months on end to fill the void in their lives where sports once held a prominent role. This begs the question, how did our students deal with not having any sports to watch for several long months?

CBA sophomore Pamela Marin, a regular fan of soccer, spent her days watching Netflix and YouTube and occasionally went outside to kick a ball around with her family while she couldn’t watch any matches. “I felt that it was going to be difficult without sports or being active in something I enjoy, so instead of sitting around I went out and practiced with my family or even if it was just myself,” Marin said.

International Baccalaureate Senior Jason Chang got busy with other activities outside of sports. “I had my brothers to play with while I was home, and I had Netflix too, so I would say not having any sports didn’t affect me too much,” Chang said.

Sophomore Soraya Morissaint, who enjoys watching gymnastics, basketball, and football, wasn’t too upset about not having sports and decided to busy herself with cartoons instead. “I would also imagine myself being an athlete and pretending I’m doing what [the professional athletes] are great at,” Morissaint said.

Other people found alternatives to sports, as was the case for CBA junior Roger Williams. Rather than watching reruns of games long past, Williams played sports video games such as NBA 2K and Madden NFL. “Video games helped me cope and forget about the fact that we were missing live sports for quite a long time,” Williams said.

Some students dealt with the postponement of live sports worse than others. “The lack of sports made me feel weak and unmotivated. I played games with my friends when there were no sports around, but it wasn’t the same,” junior Jason Jeoboam said.

Senior Gael Garcia felt bad for the sports players who were unable to finish their seasons at the high school and college level as well as the sports fans who didn’t get to see them conclude their seasons. “I felt bad for the athletes, especially the seniors, who trained this year to win their state tournaments.” Garcia used this as motivation to continue to exercise and get stronger for himself. “I kept them in mind while I was working to better myself in the gym,” Garcia said.

The return of live sports towards the end of the summer was a huge weight off the shoulders of students at DBHS, but they will never forget what it was like to live without them for an extended period of time.

Written by Jaykob Tirado | Graphic Designed by Indiya Roberts

Published October 27, 2020 | ePathfinder | Sports