Duane Bonifer  |  Published February 19, 2021

Spring Sports Given OK to Play

Fighting Scots spring teams will compete during 2020-21 academic year.

MONMOUTH, Ill. – Monmouth College athletics will return to competition this spring.

The announcement by Monmouth officials follows the decision by the Midwest Conference Presidents Council that the conference will hold competition for the spring sports of baseball, softball, men’s and women’s tennis, and men’s and women’s outdoor track and field.

BACK IN ACTION: Plays like this one from a Monmouth-Knox softball game in 2019 will return this s... BACK IN ACTION: Plays like this one from a Monmouth-Knox softball game in 2019 will return this spring after a one-season hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic.Monmouth’s men’s and women’s lacrosse and golf programs will also compete this spring. Lacrosse competes in the Midwest Lacrosse Conference, and golf competes in the St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference.

“We are excited that our student-athletes on spring teams will have the opportunity to return to competition,” said Monmouth Director of Athletics Roger Haynes. “During spring sports competition, the Monmouth community will continue to adhere to best practices and guidelines so that we can ensure the safety and health of our students, coaches, officials, guest teams and fans.”

Midwest Conference schools will be permitted to engage in spring competition against non-conference opponents as long as they adhere to the conference’s COVID-19 return-to-play protocol and end competition against non-Midwest Conference institutions 15 days before the start of conference play in each respective sport.

Midwest Conference competition in most spring sports is expected to start between late March and mid-April and will conclude by mid-May. Conference schedules will be posted online in the coming weeks, but they will be subject to change based on how health circumstances change.

Monmouth’s last home athletic event was a March 4, 2020, women’s lacrosse match against Illinois Wesleyan University, played at April Zorn Memorial Stadium. The Fighting Scots’ last intercollegiate athletic competition of any kind was a softball game played March 13, 2020, in Florida.

Spring scheduling is fluid in a regular year (there is still a substantial amount of snow on the ground in Monmouth as of Feb. 24) and there will be no trips to Florida this year to get Monmouth’s teams into much better weather conditions, due to the pandemic. The first Fighting Scots action on campus could be a women’s lacrosse match at April Zorn Stadium on March 6. That same day, the baseball team is scheduled to play a pair of teams in Fulton, Missouri, and the softball squad is slated to play new coach Alexa McClaughry’s first games, a doubleheader in Aurora, Illinois.

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