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On Thursday morning, the players’ phones started buzzing.
Jason Roche had just finished his morning workout when his St. Mary’s High of Berkeley teammates began texting. With the NBA postponing its season the night before, he had a sinking feeling about what the text message would say.
Facing concerns over the coronavirus outbreak, the California Interscholastic Federation had canceled the state basketball championship finals.
Roche and his teammates had figured they’d play the Division III championship game against Arroyo Grande in Sacramento in front of no fans, but canceling the whole tournament?
“Are they going to reschedule?” one teammate texted. “This is b.s.,” another chimed in.
Saint Mary’s was one of seven Bay Area teams scheduled to play Friday or Saturday at the Golden 1 Center, all with a shot at bringing home a state title. Now, they are left to wonder how it would have ended.
“It doesn’t seem real,” Roche, 18, said hours after receiving the news. “I’m still trying to wrap my head around it.”
The Archbishop Riordan Crusaders already knew how Roche felt. On March 7, the top-seeded boys squad in Division I was in pregame warmups when coach Joe Curtin was told to pull them off the floor. The game against De La Salle-Concord was on hold.
By Monday, as the Grand Princess cruise ship docked across the bay in Oakland, a Riordan student tested positive for coronavirus, forcing the basketball team out of the playoffs. Another case at Menlo School in Atherton ended the girls’ season.
“We were the first domino,” Curtin said. “As an adult you understand this is what happens. In life, it’s how you come out of adversity that defines you. But teenagers are emotional. Their world is small.”
Riordan senior Bryce Monroe felt he had no control over that world. Monroe had pleaded with school administrators, hoping his team could be reinstated.
“We had no control, we had no vote, no voice,” said Monroe, who said he felt a sense of “emptiness.” “I was so mad I couldn’t even say anything. It feels like they took a state championship from us.”
As the news spread Thursday, coaches called players in for meetings. On some campuses the gatherings were a combination therapy session and virus education.
“Everyone said their piece,” said Olivia Williams, a junior guard at Archbishop Mitty in San Jose, which was vying for the trophy in the top division, the Open. “Although this decision is really hard to take, it was done for the greater good. It was done to protect people.”
Longtime coaches struggled to find a comparable situation. The class of 2020 was not alive for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and not since World War II had the CIF canceled a state championship event. The track meet was called off in 1945.
“We’re all part of this community, we’re part of this world,” said St. Mary’s boys coach Rich Buckner, who coached at Riordan in 2001. “I’m not gonna put a high school basketball game over a pandemic. These kids don’t understand that. Maybe some of them do, maybe some of them don’t. I have not seen anything like it.”
“They are devastated,” said O’Dowd girls coach Malik McCord, whose team was also in the finals. “They left with smiles and feeling a little bit better, but it’s still hurting, especially the seniors. I had an unusual amount of seniors this year, the most I’ve ever had at one time.
“We let them speak how they felt, I did as well as coach, and a lot of tears were shed. And I also pointed out that it could be a lot worse. There’s people dealing with deaths in their families and issues with this virus, unfortunately. We’re blessed to wake up and play another day.”
At Oakland Technical High, senior Jordan Smith gathered for pizza and soda with her teammates on Thursday where they “talked, cried, laughed and tried to make the best of it.”
Tech was scheduled to play Palisades for the Division II title, a chance at back-to-back state titles after winning the Division IV trophy last year.
By Friday, Oakland Unified and other Bay Area districts had announced classes would be canceled over the next three weeks, adding to the uncertainty of the school year for Smith and her classmates. As captain of the team, Smith is taking extra care of her younger teammates, which includes freshmen.
“Knowing you were a game away … it’s like life is taken out of you,” Smith said. “As seniors, we are dealing with supporting the younger players.”
Cal-bound senior Monty Bowser had a reason to smile, even if his Bishop O’Dowd career did not end as expected. Sensing the tournament would be canceled, O’Dowd coach Lou Richie told his players to treat the matchup last Saturday night at Archbishop Mitty as if it were the team’s last time on the court.
The Dragons took a team picture after the win.
“Now knowing that was my last game, I can kind of smile and that brings me a little bit of joy, knowing that was our last game and we won,” Bowser said.
O’Dowd was scheduled to play Sheldon High of Elk Grove on Thursday evening, with the winner advancing to the state championship game.
On Thursday afternoon, St. Mary’s senior Roche was sitting in his car unsure of what to do before a team meeting at 3:30 p.m. Weeks of a steady routine of watching basketball film, practice, workouts and school had suddenly come to a halt.
“I have nothing to do,” he said. ”I was planning on taking visits to colleges. I don’t know if I’m supposed to travel. It feels like time was going by so fast, but these hours seem like they are taking forever.”
“We almost would have rather lost knowing we’d have some type of closure,” he said of the championship game. “We have no closure.”
