News

NCHS, Area Schools Plan Fall 7-on-7 Football League

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New Canaan High School’s athletic director is working with counterparts through the FCIAC to develop a 7-on-7 football league that’s in line with state health recommendations, the superintendent of schools said Monday night. The non-contact intramural league could include “linemen’s challenge type activities and even linemen 7-on-7 kinds of things,” Dr. Bryan Luizzi told members of the Board of Education during their regular meeting, held in the Wagner Room at NCHS and broadcast on YouTube. “That is aligned with DPH recommendations, because the 7-on-7 that is non-contact brings it from a ‘high risk’ activity to a ‘moderate risk’ activity,” he said. “Which is the same as some of the other sports we are playing now, with the mitigation strategies—like volleyball with the masks, for instance. So the league would use our district coaches, have teams of approximately 15 players and they would play against each other in the beginning, and even against other schools.

Government

Town To Re-Examine Use of Pesticides on Playing Fields 

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At Selectman Kathleen Corbet’s prompting, the town plans to re-examine a longstanding policy whereby pesticides are used on some of New Canaan’s athletic fields. First Selectman Kevin Moynihan said last week that it’s “entirely appropriate we revisit this topic.”

“It’s one I know very little about and I think the fact that we now have turf fields has changed things,” Moynihan said during the Board of Selectmen’s Sept. 8 meeting, held via videoconference. 

“And I also don’t know quite what role the Fields Committee should play in this versus Parks & Recreation versus the Town Council, so we’ll further analyze this. I know [Public Works Director] Tiger [Mann] and [Parks Superintendent] John Howe have their own views on this topic. So we will bring this back when we investigate some of those other points of contact as to who has responsibility for this policy.”

Homepage Featured

Hundreds of New Canaan Families Gather at NCHS To Support Tackle Football This Fall

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More than 400 youth and high school football players and parents gathered Monday morning at New Canaan High School to urge state officials to allow tackle football this fall. The show of support came after the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference cited a state Department of Public Health statement from last Thursday saying the agency “is unlikely to support higher risk activities for the fall term” absent “modifications to higher risk activities.” 

“As such, the CIAC Board of Control, in alignment with DPH recommendations, has determined that high risk full contact football is no longer a viable option,” the CIAC said in a press release. Instead, it’s looking at the “appropriateness” of a 7-on-7 football model, as opposed to the normal 11-on-11 game. Those gathered at Dunning Stadium on a sunny Labor Day morning pushed for the traditional game, with safety precautions. 

“The game of football is not just about winning games and putting points on the board,” Mike Benevento, president of the New Canaan Athletic Foundation, told NewCanaanite.com as dozens of football families filed into Dunning for the socially distanced show of support. “The game of football is about camaraderie.

Board of Education

Superintendent: CIAC Views High School Football As ‘High Risk’ Sport

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Given frequent and extended contact among players, football is seen by Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference officials as “high risk” amid the COVID-19 pandemic, New Canaan’s superintendent of schools said Monday night. CIAC officials view volleyball as “moderate risk,” Dr. Bryan Luizzi said during a special meeting of the Board of Education, “because it’s indoors, in a gym.”

“And the others they are putting somewhere in low to moderate,” Luizzi said of other fall sports during the meeting, held via videoconference with some Board of Ed members joining him in the Wagner Room at New Canaan High School. “Being that they are outdoors and the duration of contact in the sport—in soccer, in field hockey, it’s a short duration in the contact that they have—which is different from football or volleyball indoors. So they are looking at each sport individually and hoping that by the end of the week they come to an agreement with the [state] Department of Public Health and they are able to communicate that.”

The update—based on an afternoon call that included superintendents of schools and the CIAC executive director, Luizzi said—came as fall sport athletes wait to find out whether they’ll be able to play this season and, if so, under what conditions. The CIAC said in a press release late Sunday that schools could commence conditioning work Monday and “non-contact sport specific skill work” Saturday. 

Yet it remains unclear whether popular and widely followed sports will happen, or whether some sports will go on while others are modified or canceled.

Craig Hunt

New Canaan Flag Football Season To Open Next Month with COVID-Related Changes

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Officials with a fast-growing youth sport in New Canaan say they’re preparing to launch the fall season next month under a number of rules related to the COVID-19 public health emergency. 

New Canaan Flag Football will require masks of its players and reduce the size of both rosters and on-field teams, so the sport will be 5-on-5 this year rather than 7-on-7, according to town resident Craig Hunt, a senior official in the Recreation Department-sponsored program. “Let’s get kids out there on the field—safety first,” Hunt told NewCanaanite.com. 

“I am excited to get it going,” he said. “I am also a little nervous because New Canaan becomes a very transient community as far as vacation-goers go. If you went to North Carolina, did you quarantine your son or daughter before we start this league? Those are the concerns and I think it’s very important.