City of Basketball Love

Kevin Callahan (@CP_KCallahan)
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The Philadelphia Public League will require that basketball players need to be fully vaccinated to play this season.

“I completely understand that the Public League will be much safer once this is instituted for this year,” Constitution coach Rob Moore said Tuesday night.

The School District of Philadelphia made the announcement late last week that athletes participating in winter and spring sports will need to show proof of full vaccination.

Moore is also the athletic director at Constitution.

“I have to relay this information to all my sports teams and all my coaches,” Moore said about the winter sports programs.

Moore noted that many games were cancelled in the fall.

“I think you will see that there is going to be a lot of schools that will not be able to put together teams this year,” Moore said. “There is one hundred percent certainty that schools will not be able to get enough kids that are fully vaccinated by the timeline to put a team on the court.

“The other reality is that all of our kids should be safe.”

And, Moore added that if the players are safe, then there won’t be any shutdowns. He said the Constitution football team had its first three games cancelled because the other teams had COVID cases.

“So, part of it is our kids won't have to test anymore,” Moore said.

The Public League has over 50 teams, which mostly are under the jurisdiction of the School District of Philadelphia.

“I'm pretty sure that my entire varsity team will be vaccinated for the season, I don't think I'm going to lose anybody,” Moore said.

“I put surveys out before this even came out just because I needed to know for contact tracing,” Moore explained. “For all my sports, I needed to know who was and who wasn't vaccinated. The same thing we had to do in school just in case.”

Andre Noble is the head coach of Imhotep Charter and the School District of Philadelphia policy does not extend to the charter schools.

“Charter schools have their own school boards that would have to approve that policy,” Noble said.

“What I am proud of is from talking to our families and our students, we are already on pace to be 100 percent vaccinated anyway before this came out,” Noble added.

“Everyone has at least one shot on our team and everyone was already in position to take their second shot at the end of this week or the beginning of next week.

“So, we're expecting to be at 100 percent anyway, so I’m happy about that, but that was before and has nothing to do with the mandate coming from the school district.”

Imhotep opens on December 10 at Reading High School. The deadline for vaccinations for winter sports is December 18.

“The timeline is that they have to be fully vaccinated plus two weeks by the 18th of December, which is a five-week process,” Moore explained. ”So, there is a time constraint.”

An athlete is considered fully vaccinated two weeks after their second COVID-19 vaccine dose or two weeks after a single dose vaccine.

Moore said he is looking for clarity on the masking policy.

“The district has not really told us what to expect with that just yet,” Moore said. “I'm still looking for some answers. I don't want to say I'm concerned because it'll work itself out. But again, we'll see how this plays out.”

Until the vaccine deadline, athletes will continue to be tested two times a week.

The School District will hold information sessions on this new requirement on Nov. 4 and Nov. 9.

“I’m a staunch supporter of youth sports - they give young people values, skills and mentorship,” Philadelphia councilman and Sankofa Freedom head coach Isaiah Thomas said. “We saw the toll the pandemic has taken on our young people, especially without the outlet and camaraderie of team sports. I am thankful for everyone working to make this happen in a safe way for our young people.”