The Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (MIAC) Presidents’ Council approved Monday, Dec. 14, to continue to plan for the possibility of competitions during the winter sports seasons. The council will reconvene in mid January to confirm plans for basketball and ice hockey regular seasons, as well as indoor track and field championships.
Accordingly, Saint Mary’s University intends to proceed with winter play. However, as it was acknowledged during the MIAC meeting, planning during a pandemic is difficult. Because changes can occur quickly, it’s impossible to make any guarantees about winter competition in advance.
Our ability to compete this winter also depends on our student-athletes’ compliance with testing, social distancing, continued Healthy Roster app usage, COVIDaware MN app usage, and mask wearing. Any non-compliance with COVID-19 protocols by any team member places the season at risk. It also may result in needing to move classes online. We expect that our Cardinals will be leaders in terms of adherence to COVID protocols.
We are pleased to announce that we are partnering with Hy-Vee, Inc., for COVID-19 testing. Through their generosity we will not only meet the MIAC testing recommendations, we’ll be able to better care for our student-athletes, and allow them to fulfill their college athletic career goals.
We promise to stay in frequent communication about any new information or changes. Again, we are hopeful but will be monitoring public health, state, and federal guidance.
At this time, no final decision has been made regarding the status of fall sports that have already been moved to spring, as well as regular spring competitions.