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The fate of school sports for the fall will be decided in the coming week.

The Virginia High School League has proposed three models for possible sports schedules for the 2020-21 school year.

Coach Randy Jessee, the activities director at King’s Fork High School, was among those who attended a regional call on July 21 to decide which model is preferred. Each region will hold a meeting to choose a model to submit to VHSL so that the committee can announce by July 27 what Virginia schools will do.

“I have talked to some friends and other members across the state, and my guess would be that Model 3 is voted,” said Jessee.

Model 3 would leave all sports in the same order, but they would be condensed together and run later into the summer. This is currently the only model that does not cancel high-risk sports, since they will be on a delayed schedule.

According to Jessee, Model 2 also makes sense. This model switches fall and spring sports since with the delay in practices, baseball and softball do not need as much preparation time like football. However, the fear is that this plan runs the risk of the new season being canceled and students losing two seasons in a row.

Model 1 would leave sports in their current season and cancel all high-contact sports. According to Jessee, no one is looking at that plan since it would cancel football, the cash cow of high school sports.

“No football would be catastrophic,” said Jessee. “Most school programs run off money made off of basketball and mostly football. I talked to other coaches from North Carolina and South Carolina, and because they canceled football, other sports had to be cut due to lack of funding.”

The VHSL committee voted on a July 15 meeting unanimously to meet July 27 to discuss fall sports’ fate for this season after considering each region’s wants.