When the bell rang on Friday, Dec. 19, the majority of the student body rushed out of school, not planning on coming back until Jan. 5. But for all winter sports, the school will be a frequently visited place during the break as practice continues despite the winter break. However, UIL rules require all schools to take at least a five day break, so the sports will resume practice on Dec. 27.

“The UIL requires every school in the state to take five consecutive days off during Christmas, including the day before and after the 25,” boy’s head basketball coach Kyle Herrema said. “Once we get back from that break, all four of our teams will be back in practice.”

Once the five day break requirement is met, practice resumes.

“[We will be practicing during the break] quite a bit,” girl’s varsity soccer coach Misty Benson said. “I don’t know how many days specifically, but the girls have a pretty long break and then some substantial practice time as well.”

Winter break falls right before soccer starts its pre-season games and tournaments, so the time off must be used to practice and prepare.

“[We are practicing over break] because, like a lot of sports, for instance volleyball and football who give up part of their summer, basketball who gives up part of their Thanksgiving and Christmas breaks, we have games and things to prepare for and we have to take that time to prepare and being part of a sport involves sacrifice, and that’s one of them,” Benson said.

Boys basketball has two games over the break, so the break will be used to prepare for these upcoming matches.

“We have two games over the break,” Herrema said. “Dec. 29 we play Rockwall Heath and on Jan. 2 we have our district opener against McKinney North. We won’t have much time to prepare for Heath, just a Saturday practice on Dec. 27.”

Typically, boy’s basketball will play a tournament over the holidays, but this year will be a little different.

“We have three days of preparation for McKinney North,” Herrema said. “Normally we would play a Christmas tournament but the way the calendar fell this year, we would lose that extra day of preparation for North. We will go about 2 and a half hours each day. It is pretty shocking but we lost some pretty significant conditioning over the 5 day holiday. Those 2 and a half hour practice sessions will definitely get us ready to go.”

Many athletes do not mind the fact that they have practice because they still get a break while also preparing for their upcoming games.
“I don’t really mind having basketball over the break,” freshman Rachel Langs said. “We have a break over the actual holidays and still get touches on the ball to make us better for when we get back.”