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UPDATE: Doddridge cross country teams allowed to run in postseason

Update to original story: Doddridge County Superintendent of Schools Adam Cheeseman has announced that the Bulldogs cross country teams have been allowed to compete in Thursday’s regional meet. The meet will be hosted by Tucker County High School. Cheeseman’s statement is below:

 

(Original story from Monday below)

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — The Doddridge County boys and girls cross country teams have combined to win eleven state cross country championships. Barring a last-second change of plans from the Governor’s office, the Bulldogs will not have an opportunity to add to those totals next weekend.

Doddridge County was the lone county on Saturday’s state COVID metrics map listed as red. Red counties are required to halt all competitions and practices. Regional meets in high school cross country are scheduled for Thursday afternoon and all teams and individuals most compete in regionals to qualify for the state meet on Halloween.

“By no means are we being disrespectful here,” said Doddridge County Superintendent of Schools Adam Cheeseman. “We understand (Gov. Justice) is in a tough situation. I just feel like I could probably explain what is happening within Doddridge County and make the picture a little clearer. We are having a hard time understanding how nineteen active cases in the county as of (Sunday) would warrant us to be according to the map, the most dangerous county in the state.

“We want our children in school and we believe we can do so safely. We ran up into a substitute teacher shortage issue a couple of weeks ago. But I believe we have a plan now that we will roll out that can get our kids back to school. It is a blended model and it helps solve our substitute teacher shortage.”

On Thursday, the WVSSAC, in consultation with the Governor’s office and the DHHR, announced that athletes from orange counties may compete in cross country regionals if athletes test negative for COVID. That opportunity is not available to athletes from a red county. Cross country is deemed a ‘low risk’ sport by the NFHS.

“If a student-athlete tests negative, a negative athlete is a negative athlete. We just don’t see how it makes a whole lot of sense that that is the cutoff point, especially considering we have 19 active cases with 8,400 people in the county.”

Cheeseman says the Doddridge cross country team members were tested on Friday in anticipation of the Saturday map results. No athletes have tested positive, while some are still awaiting the test results.

“We tried to follow and meet every expectation and we tried to follow these guidelines. Now we are at the point where the metrics have been tweaked a time or two. It helped the larger counties with the ‘percent positive’. And perhaps we are the first smaller county that is coming up against this. Maybe we are learning here that it doesn’t do the smaller counties the justice that it did the larger counties.”

At his regularly scheduled press briefing Monday afternoon, Governor Jim Justice left the door open to possibly change the current rules.

“We are trying to work it out,” Justice said. “It is a very, very, very difficult thing because I know how much our kids and our athletes have put into this.”

Cheeseman has been in constant communication with WVSSAC Executive Director Bernie Dolan and conversations continue.

“Mr. Dolan is simply doing what he has been instructed to do,” Cheeseman said. “I find no fault with him or the SSAC. He has been very positive with us. He has been encouraging and obviously would like to see all student-athletes participate.”

Doddridge County Superintendent of Schools Adam Cheeseman

On Monday, the WVSSAC announced that the Class AA-A Region II meet, which Doddridge County was scheduled to host, has been moved to Tucker County High School. The meet remains scheduled for Thursday afternoon.

“I have talked to my coach Craig Kellar and he would take the student-athletes anywhere to run,” Cheeseman said. “We are not concerned about hosting. If it is deemed that we cannot, that is fine. We will go to Tucker County. Just give them a chance to finish out their season that they worked so hard for.”

Doddridge County was not able to compete in last week’s Little Kanawha Conference championship and the Bulldogs have not been able to practice in two weeks. Cheeseman says team members are doing what they can to work out individually in the hopes they will be allowed to compete Thursday.

“Although we cannot have formal practices, I know that these student-athletes have continued to run on their own,” Cheeseman said. “I know they have been putting in the work because that’s the kind of people they are.”

The DCHS boys team is the state’s top-ranked Class A squad in the latest runwv.com rankings and the girls are ranked second.

“At a very young age, people in Doddridge County understand the importance of cross country and track,” Cheeseman said. “And they get involved. It is a tribute to our coaches and to our parents and our community in general. There is a very large emphasis on those two sports and we are very proud of that.”





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