Parts of Illinois can start high school basketball. Here’s the metro-east’s status
Some youth sports teams in Illinois, including high school squads, can begin competing again at the interconference region or league level, Illinois Department of Public Health Director Ngozi Ezike announced Friday.
Athletes in regions meeting the metrics for Phase 4 of the Restore Illinois Plan will be able to compete, including sports like basketball and wrestling, which IDPH has labeled as higher risk for the spread of COVID-19.
Sports will still look different, though: masks must be worn in practice and competition and there will be a cap at 50 spectators.
Three regions were in Phase 4 on Friday, including Region 5, the state’s southernmost region. The metro-east is in Region 4, however, which was moved from Tier 3 to Tier 2 mitigations on Friday. Sports are still off the table for the seven-county region.
Mitigation tiers are based on certain COVID-19 data within the region, including positivity rates for testing and hospital capacity. As coronavirus numbers look more promising in a region, mitigations such as restaurant closures and gatherings relax.
In Tier 2, lower-risk sports like cross country, track and field and competitive cheer can compete, but moderate- and higher-risk sports are limited to practices of varying intensities. Higher-risk sports must have no-contact practices.
Under IDPH’s guidelines, no part of the state yet qualifies for tournaments, out-of-conference or league play, out-of-state play or championship games for higher risk sports.
To move to Tier 1, a region needs to meet three criteria: the seven-day average for test positivity needs to be below 8% for three consecutive days, 20% of staffed ICU hospital beds must be available for three consecutive days on a seven-day average, and over seven of 10 days, the seven-day average for COVID-19 patients in the hospital can’t show sustained increase.
The seven-day average for test positivity in Region 4 was 8.4% as of Tuesday, the most recent data available from IDPH. On Thursday, 21% of staffed ICU beds in the region were available.
Region 4 includes St. Clair, Madison, Monroe, Clinton, Bond, Randolph and Washington Counties. Individual counties cannot be pulled from the rest of the region. If St. Clair County, for example, were to meet all of the criteria for Tier 1 before the rest of the region, it would not be able to move on its own.
The Illinois High School Association, which oversees high school sports, has a meeting Wednesday, at which new season dates are expected to be set.
This story was originally published January 22, 2021 at 5:02 PM.
