High school sports such as tennis, golf held their first events of the year on Wednesday throughout the state

Lakeview tennis coach Jeff Van Dis usually talks about the basics with his team before a match.

Hustling on the court.

Strong forehand.

You know, tennis stuff.

But as the Spartans opened the 2020 fall sports boys tennis season, he had some different coaching tips.

“Usually, as a coach, my two priorities are, make you a better tennis player, make you a better person. But No. 1 priority this year is safety. Doing all the right things out there so we can be safe and the sport can be safe,” Van Dis said. “The kids are really excited to be out here, they really are. But it’s been a lot of work to get to this point.

“Not only have we had to get ready for the season on the court, we have had to do a lot of reading and learning about how to do the right things once we are on the court. For example, hand sanitizers on every single court, cleaning down the equipment afterwards, keep the mask on at all times when they aren’t playing a match.

“We are excited we get to play, but getting our safety protocols down has been our No. 1 thing.” 

Wednesday was the first official day high schools in Michigan could hold competitions in any sport since the MHSAA shut things down last March due to the coronavirus pandemic. After a spring season without any sports and a summer of questions, sports such as golf and tennis were allowed to schedule events this week. And with Lakeview hosting Gull Lake in a season opener in boys tennis, the smiles were everywhere.

“We were curious all summer if we were going to have a season or not. Now we are fired up that we get to be out here,” said Lakeview senior Cole Einhardt. “A lot of things are different, but we are ready to adapt and once the matches start, it will all feel the same when we are out there.”

As of Wednesday, other fall sports were still waiting to hear what the future held for them, specifically higher-risk activities and/or indoor activities like soccer, volleyball and  swimming. The MHSAA is expected to make a ruling on the possible start dates for those sports soon.

In the meantime, sports seen as low risk, such as cross country, tennis and golf are expected to have a full schedule this fall. And some of those sports might even have some new faces.

“The guys are revved up to be here, to be playing,” said Gull Lake tennis coach Ben Brott. “We even have some football kids who came out since they aren’t going to have any games until the spring. So it was nice for them to come out and they are excited to see some competition of any kind.”

The fate of the high school football season for this fall was decided last week when the MHSAA announced it was planning a move to the spring. While the athletes that were able to compete on Wednesday were excited to do so, they felt bad for their classmates on the football team.

“I feel very fortunate I am a tennis player instead of football player right now,” Einhardt said. “This sucks for the football guys. You don’t want to see that happen to any of the sports, maybe losing their senior year, not getting to play. But I guess they could still come out for tennis if they want.”

Contact Bill Broderick (269) 966-0678 or bbroderi@battlecreekenquirer.com. Follow him on Twitter @billbroderick.