WIU readies for the future of sports
MACOMB – Coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic and back to sports, Western Illinois athletic director Danielle Surprenant admits things will look different right away.
Which is why the AD wants to have multiple plans in place so that the university can stay a step ahead of what the future may bring.
From scheduling to budget, Surprenant said the university is trying to think of everything so that they will not be surprised by anything.
“There’s no doubt going to have to be some changes to everything in terms of the way we operate,” she said. “We’re going to have to play more regional games, have less financial and travel challenges. We’re seeing the impact of COVID-19, so we’re looking at a lot of different things, looking where we can fine-tune and save some money without impacting staffing or the student-athlete experience.”
All across the country, universities have had to drop athletic programs, and while Western has done that in the past, Surprenant is confident everyone will be back in the fall, but once again, the department can only work with what it has.
“Right now it is so hard to predict, we still don’t know all the impacts COVID-19 might have, we have the NCAA recommendations that are smaller, but I feel like we have about five different budget projections in place and we’re trying to figure out which one we will go with,” she said. “Whether it is fall sports, having students on campus in the summer, we have some projections but we have to wait to figure out which we can go with.”
And as of now, Surprenant is hoping to welcome staff and students back soon while also admitting the athletic department may have to forgo some summer activities.
“To be honest, I don’t think athletics will probably have the youth camps in July,” she said. “We haven’t made a fine decision on youth camps yet, and we’ll try to hold off as long as possible because we have had success with them in the past.
“The attendee numbers though, it is tough, will we be able to have more than 10 in a group, 50 in a group, what would that look like? Right now, we’re more focused on getting our staff back and welcoming our student athletes back. We’re making sure that is a top priority during this time.”
Surprenant admits it will not be easy, especially when it comes to the international student population of Western, and not just athletes.
But the way WIU handled getting international students to their home country has the AD feeling good about bringing everyone back.
“I would say with out international student population, and not just student athletes, I feel like we were on the front end of this,” she said. “The second COVID-19 started we worked on sending our students back to their home country or making sure they had resources in town.
“Now the question is, what is it going to look like to get them back to Western, the current and new students? We’ve stressed to our coaches the importance of constant communication with all our student-athletes, work with them and have a lot of conversations. We want to provide any assistance they may need to get back to Western, whether they are returning or new students.”