By Mehak Garg
COVID-19 has affected what the recruitment process for collegiate sports looks like, with some student-athletes benefiting from the pandemic while others are at a disadvantage, said senior and water polo recruit Jason Do. Beyond recruitment, universities have had to alter how collegiate athletics will function this season due to restrictions brought on by COVID-19. Colleges nation-wide have changed what team practices and workouts entail, MHS Class of 2020 alum and Washington University in St.Louis (WashU) track and field recruit Solomon Kang said.
COVID has actually helped me with my recruiting process because it gave me a chance to work on myself and improve over these past few months, Do said in a Zoom interview. Some athletes are really skilled and have been playing since they were kids, and I started late in comparison, Do added.
“I was driving up to San Jose around seven days a week, practicing up there for like three hours with my coaches during COVID,” Do said. “[For] some people, [COVID] doesn’t really help out that much because some guys on the team right now actually want to get recruited. They don’t have any film (recordings of past matches), and we can’t have games.”
I filmed my games and practices at the end of junior year and started sending emails out to coaches in late August, Do said. Because I was able to record my practices junior year, I wasn’t running into the problems some other players had, Do added.
“COVID canceled official visits, but I did a visit up to the school and took a few pictures,” Do said. “From there, one day, I called up the coach to verbally commit to the University of the Pacific.”
In preparation for the collegiate season, Do continues to practice in and out of school. The water polo team at MHS is currently having offseason practice which started in July, Do said. In addition to going to the gym four days a week, he meets with the co-captains from last year to watch films to understand how he can improve for the upcoming season, Do added.
Kang explains his recruitment journey and how COVID changed what sports look like at WashU. “In late August, I started emailing coaches … to take initiative and try to be on [a school’s] radar,” Kang said over Zoom. “ [After WashU indicated that they were interested in me], I came for a campus visit during which I met with the coach. She answered some questions I had, and I felt like I was more certain about whether or not I want to apply to the school.”
Similar to Do, Kang continued to practice during the pandemic, he said. In March, after quarantine started, the Lynbrook track coach gave him some drills to do and shared his workout, so he had a list of daily workouts, Kang said.
“During May, the coaches from WashU sent out their workout schedule for the summer, and I started following their schedule and sets [until college started],” Kang said. “Now I’m on campus working out with the team at WashU’s athletic complex.”
In order to ensure student safety, WashU has implemented a lot of safety protocols like checking sites where he has to indicate that he’s completed the screening process and an online form that asks for your body temperature and if you’ve been in contact with anyone who tested positive, Kang said. Before being allowed to enter the complex, they take your temperature again to make sure you’re not lying, and then they give you a wristband indicating you are clear to go, Kang added.
“Once we’re on the field, we’re required to wear masks during warm-up and also between workouts. If there’s a lot of running one day and really intense breathing, you’re allowed to take your mask off, but you have to be twelve feet apart,” Kang said.