Covid-19 Dims the Friday Night Lights of Texas Football

October 22, 2020
Sport

Underclassmen are training for next season, flipping tractor tires and fashioning weights from gallons of water. The sounds of fall have gone silent — the pompom verve of the cheerleaders, the brassy pep of the band.

“It feels empty,” said Meza, 45. “Even the traffic level feels low. It’s an eerie feeling walking the halls and there’s nobody there.”

At Rio Hondo High School, extracurricular activities will not be permitted until students return to classrooms, said Rocky James, 52, the football coach and athletic director. In-person schooling kept being pushed back, to next Monday or possibly into November. That would have left room for only two football games. So the season was shelved.

James said he might have expected dozens of calls of complaint. He got none.

“If they’re too scared to come to school, how is it fair to play football?” he said.

Only six offensive linemen were among the interested in playing at La Joya High.

“Some parents didn’t think it was safe,” said Reuben Farías, 54, La Joya’s head coach. “No vaccine.”

Farías understood. Over the summer, when he would normally have been preparing for the season, he instead found himself among the grieving. On July 18, his father, Ruben, died of a heart attack related to Covid-19. He was 83.