Following a trend seen across the state, local high school sports leagues have moved the remainder of fall sports to the spring time.

The 2A Evergreen League, 2B Pacific League and several 1A Evergreen League schools made the decision to move cross country, girls swim and dive, boys golf and girls tennis to Season 3 of the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association’s modified sports calendar for the 2020-21 school year. Those sports will begin practice the first week of March, joining the traditional fall sports of football, volleyball and girls soccer, which were moved to Season 3 when the WIAA modified-schedule announcement was made in late July.

“We were one of the last holdouts in western Washington for 2A leagues to go to a Season 3 option,” new Aberdeen Athletic Director John Crabb said shortly after a Zoom meeting with other 2A Evergreen ADs discussing the matter.

In that discussion, Crabb stated the league’s ADs made the decision final on Wednesday.

“We were holding out hope things would get better week-by-week because it’s a two-week increment as far as cases are concerned,” he said. “So we were thinking about holding out to the end to see if we could do this thing. But the trends aren’t getting any better.

“We’re only two weeks out of school and it’s coming to a head real quick, so we thought we better make that decision and we did.”

The 2A Greater St. Helen’s League, which falls under the same WIAA District as the 2A Evergreen and whose member schools often schedule contests in the area, announced on Friday it would be suspending all fall sports until the spring.

The moves come after Governor Jay Inslee announced earlier this month that schools in the state should go to an online-only instructional format and cancel or postpone sports and extracurricular activities.

”The governor changed the parameters of school openings to high, moderate and low risk rather than phases,” Crabb said. “In our league, Lewis County (schools) are at high risk and the rest of us are at moderate risk, and both of those levels recommend not to have extracurricular activities. So based upon the governor’s and health department’s recommendations, we decided not to participate in fall sports as a league and a school district.”

Raymond Athletic Director Mike Tully confirmed that both the 2B Pacific and Central Leagues will be moving any remaining fall sports to the spring.

“Our league covers five counties,” he said. “So I it wasn’t realistic to think they would all be able to compete in another month.”

Montesano AD Tim Trimble and Elma AD Rob Ohashi confirmed their schools would not be participating in any sports in the fall.

Hoquiam AD Annette Duvall had yet to respond at the time of this writing.

The switch to Season 3 for all fall sports comes as no surprise to Crabb, who stated it was expected.

“At this point, with the way things have gone this summer, (the decision) doesn’t surprise anybody,” he said.