Lakers season comes to an early end

by Dalton Johnson, Staff Writer

The effects of Co-Vid19 can be felt everywhere. This is certainly the case for the Iowa Lakes Community College baseball team. The National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA) cancelled the baseball season in mid-Mar.

            “It was a definitely awkward, just weird, end to everything,” said Iowa Lakes head baseball coach, Joey Palovich. Palovich said that he was surprised that the baseball season was not cancelled sooner.

            “We kind of cancelled later than I anticipated; I thought the NJCAA did a good job of waiting and seeing as much as they could,” said Palovich. “At first they gave us some wiggle room and said that everything was postponed for a few weeks.”

            Palovich also said that the first sign he got that the pandemic was a serious thing was when the NBA cancelled their season.

            “I said ‘oh crap’ and I figured we would follow soon after,” said Palovich. With the signs that the baseball season would be cancelled, Palovich was hoping for one last game.

            “I was hoping we would at least get one last day to play, to travel with our team,” said Palovich. “Everyone on our team knew it was going to be happening pretty quick, and if it wasn’t a postponement, it would probably be cancelled, but luckily we got that last double header in on Fri. (Mar. 13 in Creston),” said Palovich.

            Palovich described the precautions taken by Southwestern Community College as “intense.”

            “They put Purell (hand sanitizer) in our dug out, they put hand wipes in our dugout and we didn’t shake hands” said Palovich. Palovich said that a day later the NJCAA pulled the plug on the spring sports season.

            Despite the sudden end to the season, Palovich said that the players took it well. “When I told the team, they talked and turned in jerseys and everyone could see the writing on the wall that it was going to happen,” said Palovich.

            Iowa Lakes Sophomore pitcher Jacob Meyer, who is continuing his baseball career at Purdue, Fort Wayne, echoed Pavlovich’s words.

            “Everybody was sad,” said Meyer. Meyer did not play in the Laker’s final game of the season on Mar. 13 because he was unable to travel.

            “I was supposed to pitch on Sunday (Mar. 15) but that ended up being cancelled,” said Meyer. Despite the setback, Meyer said he is still training to maintain the level of athleticism that he had going into the season.

            “I have to do my own workouts, so I’m doing a lot of pushups and abs right now,” said Meyer. Palovich says he is trying to communicate with the team to do workouts during this time so they can maintain the level of athleticism the team had going into to the season.

            “I’ve been really disconnected with the team for the most part. I’ve had a lot of individual conversations, and it’s really based on what they have around them,” said Palovich. “Our team is a team that has kids from 10 plus different states, plus Canada, plus France; there is a lot of different places they all went back to,” said Palovich. “We have a generic plan that we sent out, but in general they can only do what’s around them and what’s available,” said Palovich.

            Palovich said how crazy the situation has been with the end of the baseball season due to the pandemic. 

            “It was a really awkward end because there was no finality,” said Palovich. “It’s been a circus for sure.”