The COVID-19 pandemic took the world by surprise this Spring. It has impacted our way of life in so many drastic ways, specifically for sports. Professional, college, high school, and recreational teams postponed or canceled their entire seasons due to social distancing and crowd limitations. According to Statistica, potential financial losses are astounding. In essence, gate revenue in the NBA is estimated at $450 million, the loss of TV and marketing rights for March Madness is $867.5 million, and the average loss per school is $17,000.

These losses sparked me to want to ask what our Black Knight Nation’s perspective was. With the help of VoxPopMe, a market research technology company, I was able to collect video insight from 40 respondents, from both Stamford High and a random sample of U.S. sports fans on the impact of sports during this time of coronavirus. I posed the following question: “What are your thoughts and feelings about the recent COVID-19 outbreak in relation to sports that you follow, watch, or participate in? Please tell us about specific sports/teams and how coronavirus has impacted them, sports news, and in turn, you.” 

Utilizing artificial intelligence, we learned that more than half (54%) felt negative about the situation, about 1 in 4 (26%) had felt positive, and 1 in 5 were neutral. A summary of the main ideas is shown in this word cloud.

Several themes emerged:

• Sadness. Most importantly, the seniors will not have the opportunity to play their last high school game and it was our last chance to make memories with our teams.
• Concern for Safety. While it is unfortunate that we had to postpone or cancel seasons, this is how we are going to stop the spread of the virus.  
• Boredom. I’m done with the replays of sports from years past and the alternatives aren’t any better, like Death Diving (Døds) in Norway or the National Cherry Pit Spitting Contest on ESPN.
• Hope. Sports makes us feel better in times of sadness, but in the absence of it, we should be grateful for our teachers and coaches that are trying to make the best of this time. We will be back!

As a senior of the class of 2020, I was ecstatic to make the memories that every high school student thinks about as soon as they enter high school as a freshman. From my senior baseball season to prom and graduation, it genuinely upsets me that our senior year had to end like this. However, at this point, there is nothing we can do but strive to make things better. Please try your best to stay inside, stay clean, and do what will, in turn, diminish the effects of this virus.