Students in the Bethlehem school district are reacting after the district chose to not have soccer or field hockey seasons this fall.
Those are sports the state has classified as low-risk, and was allowing to move forward.
But the district is pointing to the nigh-impossibility of keeping players separated on the field for those sports.
There's no mention by district of possible delayed soccer and field hockey seasons in 2021.
It's all something that's adding up to disappointment for those at the school who love to compete.
"It still doesn't even seem real that because of what they said, we might not even get a chance to play at all," said Bethlehem senior and soccer player Chase Livesey. "For me personally, some of the underclassmen, we'll never get a chance to play with them again, this is our last chance to be a team and I might never get a chance to play soccer for Bethlehem Central High School ever again."
"Me and a bunch of my teammates actually played this summer for ADK Field Hockey and there's not a single case, and my coach did a great job of making everyone social distance as much as possible, and everyone wearing masks necessary, and to know that Bethlehem could do that, our athletes are totally 100 percent capable of doing that, and for Bethlehem to make that decision for us not to play is heartbreaking," said Bethlehem senior and field hockey player Natalie Qualia.
"It's really frustrating for me especially. I'm the manager, I don't play these sports but in the spring I had baseball taken away from me because of this pandemic, and you know, I'm friends with all of these people that play fall sports, and they had this hope, this slight hope, that they'd be able to play in the fall, and knowing that we were given the opportunity at the state and higher levels and it's taken away, it hurts, you know. It really does," said Bethlehem soccer team manager Andrew Ramsey.