Wrestling district meet rescheduled

In the space of a single day Thursday, Tucumcari’s wrestling team was put through an emotional wringer when New Mexico suspended the sport, then reinstated it hours later.

The whipsaw event also served notice to many schools that all prep sports were in a precarious position because of rising coronavirus cases there.

The Rattler wrestlers had just boarded the bus Thursday morning to go to their season-opening district match at St. Michael’s in Santa Fe when athletic director Wayne Ferguson informed them the match — and season — were off.

“There were lots of broken hearts and a few tears shed,” Ferguson said Friday. “There was utter disappointment and a feeling of hopelessness that it was taken away from them again.”

Tucumcari wrestling coach Eddie Encinias admitted he was one of those who became emotional, especially for his two seniors, Dyson Clark and Colt Garcia.

“It was not one of my better days,” he said Friday. “It was difficult when the kids were working so hard and putting out so much effort, especially when this is one of the hardest-working groups I’ve had. To be pulled off the bus, to tell them their season was basically over, there was a lot of emotion. That was a hard thing to swallow.”

That afternoon, it was announced high-school wrestling had been reinstated.

“It was a better emotion this time,” Encinias said.

Because the postponed match was a district meet, that was rescheduled to Thursday this week. In response, the Rattlers’ only schedule home meet Friday was canceled.

Details about the sport’s suspension and reinstatement last week remained fuzzy. The Albuquerque Journal reported the New Mexico Activities Association was instructed to suspend the 2021 spring season Thursday morning.

About 3 p.m. Thursday, with a green light from the state’s Medical Advisory Team, NMAA executive director Sally Marquez said, the season had been reinstated.

Marquez, reached by the newspaper in Indianapolis, said an increase in positive COVID-19 cases among athletes in the state and nationwide led state officials to initially instruct the NMAA to suspend the season.

A spokeswoman with state’s Public Education Department told the Journal it was not the agency that made the call to suspend the season. The newspaper could not reach Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham for comment.

During a videoconference Friday morning with the NMAA and other athletic directors, Ferguson said they learned the governor and her staff were unhappy with the lack of mask compliance by athletes and fans, citing photographs posted on social media and in newspapers.

“They were focusing on making sure all the players, coaches and fans attending practices and games to wear a mask,” Ferguson said. “If things don’t improve, basketball either is in jeopardy of being canceled or having fans banned from (games) again. There was the possibility of if it doesn’t improve, we could lose sports again.”

Ferguson said COVID-19 cases among New Mexico’s student population are going up since it allowed the resumption of in-person classes in March and early April.

Ferguson said some school districts and counties have become lax in recent weeks in preventing the spread of the virus.

“Counties in the turquoise and green, some people think they don’t have to wear masks,” he said. “There’s some ADs who focus on people wearing masks like I do, and there’s some that don’t. The schools that (aren’t following regulations) are just going to have to do a better job.”

Ferguson has been seen at recent Tucumcari basketball games imploring fans to wear their masks properly or face ejection from the gym.

Marquez’s comments to the Journal about vigilance against the virus echoed Ferguson’s.

“I think what the public needs to understand is, we need to do a better job with following the governor’s (safety) protocols in all sports,” she said. “That includes mask wearing, social distancing, and includes spectators. COVID is still here, so in order to get to the finish line for all sports, we need right now to do what’s right.”

Ferguson said he anticipated new NMAA guidelines this week where a coach will be warned by referees if a player isn’t wearing his or her mask properly. A second infraction will result in the coach being ejected from the game.

Ferguson said the state always was reluctant to allow wrestling to proceed this spring because it is one of the closest-contact sports. He said one school also experienced a recent case where one wrestler spread COVID-19 to another.

In a statement last week, New Mexico’s education secretary said the Public Education Department would go back to a shutdown mode if it has to.

“We are not out of the woods when it comes to this virus, and we will not hesitate to move a building to remote learning if safety conditions warrant such actions,” PED Secretary Ryan Stewart said. “I thank the school staff and district leaders for taking these cases seriously and making the necessary and tough decisions to ensure that schools do not spread the disease and that students and staff are kept safe.”