NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WKRN) —The high school football season kicks off Friday night for Metro Nashville Public Schools and the season has already hit some bumps in the road.
The season opener for Hillwood High School against McGavock High School has been postponed due to a case of COVID-19.
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According to an email from Hillwood’s principal, the case is from their school. He said they are looking forward to returning to competition, but the safety of both teams must come first.
News 2 spoke with McGavock High School’s coach, Coach Jay gore, on Thursday before this announcement was made.
He talked about how excited he was for his players to get back on the field and is taking his 42nd year of teaching day by day.
Coach Gore has faced several challenges so far — adjusting to virtual classes, losing spring practice, the whole summer and scrimmage games.
His roster is smaller for many reasons.
Several students rely on the bus to get them to school and without in person classes, parents either don’t have the resources or have to work and can’t drive them to practice.
Coach Gore said his freshman team went from 35 players to just 12.
“Our numbers are down, our numbers are reflective, of some parents don’t want their parents to come because they are afraid of the virus, even though we are doing everything we are supposed to do. We wipe down equipment, we check temperatures every day, again that goes into all the other things we’re having to do besides our normal stuff,” explained Coach Gore.
Although they lost the summer to practice and scrimmages, Coach Gore said he understands the decisions made by Metro health leaders and will make the most of what they have left.
“Our track team, our baseball, our softball, our soccer team in the spring, all of those spring sports, they lost their season. We thought we might lose ours, so we’re excited just to have the chance to have something and play whatever games we can and get out there and take advantage of a few of those Friday nights,” said Coach Gore.
The McGavock-Hillwood game is postponed but there are five other matchups on the schedule between Metro Schools Friday night as the season gets underway. Antioch will also travel outside the county to face Smyrna.
The district has not announced a new date for the postponed game. Hillwood’s principal told News 2 he anticipates resuming football activities next week and hopes the next game against Glencliff will go on as planned.
McGavock will now play Goodpasture Christian School in Madison Friday night.
News 2 digs deeper into how schools are moving forward safely for the new academic year. See how other districts around Middle Tennessee are handling everything from classroom concerns to the future of sports in our special series. Click here to see more.
