The world has endured an array of changes in the last couple of years, and those differences have not avoided the world of athletics. Cancellations and the occasional quarantining became something the general public grew accustomed to no matter the level. In the high school world, athletic directors faced many of the issues at hand regarding these potential hazards.
In the Gazette area, four new athletic directors were hired for the 2021-22 academic school year, and all of them understood the challenges at hand. They remained organized in order to ensure the security of their teams’ seasons.
“Staying on top of it made it not really a challenge,” said Hopkins Academy athletic director Vinny Catania.
Along with Catania, James Kelley (Hampshire Regional), Brittany Williams-Sleight (Granby) and Dave Proulx (Northampton) were hired as ADs at their respective institutions prior to this school year.
Each had their own different path to their jobs. The timing could not have been more perfect for Catania to step into his role. He had helped Hopkins’ previous athletic director Erik Sudnick in the years before he was no longer the athletic director. Then, three weeks after Catania finished graduate school at Endicott College, Sudnick stepped down from the role, which allowed Catania to take over.
“It worked out perfect timing-wise,” said Catania. “I didn’t necessarily think I was going to be in this position at this point in my life.”
Each AD followed a unique path into their new gig.
Kelley was an assistant athletic director at the Brooks School in North Andover before coaching lacrosse and basketball at the Bancroft School in Worcester.
Proulx, meanwhile, was exclusively involved with college athletics — specifically the offices of Western New England University from 2009 to 2021. He received promotions to serve as compliance director and assistant athletic director during his tenure. Along with that, he remains an assistant women’s basketball coach at the school in addition to his AD work at Northampton High School.
For Proulx, there has been an adjustment going from college to high school athletics.
“[An adjustment was] going from a department of 30-something coaches, athletic trainers, administrators — having the ability to walk down the hall and know that your coach is available and sit in their office and talk to, now going to a department of one where you’re kind of focused on all aspects of the job and some of your coaches are part-time,” he explained.
Kelley was used to a different schedule as someone who was consistently in the private school system, and he said he’s had to make some mental adjustments to the new timetable.
“I guess in the private school world, most of the games are on Wednesdays and Saturdays pretty reliably,” he said. “But with public schools, we got a lot more night games — games every day of the week.”
With the heightened spread of COVID-19 earlier in the school year, coaches and athletic directors were forced to be on high alert for their teams.
“Once we all went back inside and the weather got a little bit colder, and we had to take that stuff a little more seriously, and the cases kind of ticked up again. It put a lot of pressure on coaches because they didn’t necessarily know who was going to be there on a week-to-week basis,” Kelley said.
Along with the athletes, attendees of events had to be accounted for.
“Right before Christmas, we made the decision to limit fans in the stands,” Proulx said. “So I worked with my administrators to figure out the correct plan of how many people should come in, and having them masked, and having immediate family only.”
Now in the spring season, athletic programs have enjoyed the ability to be back outside again. At Hampshire Regional specifically, an exciting new program has emerged.
“We’re in a position where we’ve actually added a girls lacrosse program this spring,” Kelley said. “We were a little worried on how it might impact our track numbers, but for the most part our track numbers and softball numbers have been steady.”
Additionally, some programs will hopefully be able to thrive in the new statewide tournament format.
“We’re one of the larger school districts in the area — we have a lot of competitive teams that play in that Division I Western Mass. area and Division II at the state,” Proulx said. “And I’m excited to see our teams compete at that statewide level. And I’m excited to see how our region does as a whole.”
With sports looking a bit more normal this spring, athletic programs have a lot to be excited about, and the new athletic directors are ready to fulfill that excitement.