Local sports will make a long-awaited return in just one week as high school football kicks off in the area.

As always, the KGGF family of radio stations will be following multiple teams throughout the season. You can catch Field Kindley football with Matt Jordan on Sonshine 98.9, KQQF. Jared Sleppy and Kyle Hey will team up to bring you Caney football on 104.1, KGGF. And finally, Connor Harbit will have Game of the Week football on the Mighty 690, KGGF AM.

If you can't wait that long, make sure to tune in to our coach's breakfast this Saturday from 8-10 AM area coaches stop by and talk with us about the beginning of what is sure to be an interesting season.

CCC's basketball teams will be getting started a little later than usual. Due to the NJCAA's postponement of all sports until 2021, basketball season will begin in January rather than its usual November start. 

The Red Raven men will begin with a couple of standalone games, meeting Missouri State University - West Plains on January 20th before a matchup with Labette Community College on the 23rd.

Both the men and women will then begin their Jayhawk Conference campaigns on the road against Hutchinson on the 27th. You can view the men's schedule here, while the women's schedule can be seen at this link.

Independence Community College has named its new Women's Basketball coach for the upcoming season. The Pirates will be led by 20-year head coaching veteran Jim Turgeon.

Turgeon is coming off of a 3-year stint at NCAA Division I Denver University.  Under his leadership, the Pioneers recorded a 42-39 record and won their first WNIT in program history. Before taking over at Denver, Turgeon coached for Colorado State University – Pueblo (NCAA DII), Iowa Western Community College (NJCAA), and Dodge City Community College (NJCAA).

The Pirates' new head coach is a Kansas native, born in Topeka along with his three sisters and brother. He has two children, Thomas and Taylor, with his wife, Tracey. Turgeon comes from a family of coaches, including his brother Mark, who is currently the head Men's Basketball coach at the University of Maryland. His son, Thomas, is an assistant to the Women’s Basketball program at Our Lady of the Lake University in San Antonio. His father coached at Hayden High School in Topeka.

Turgeon is replacing former ICC women's coach Leslie Crane, who left the program after the 2019-20 season. The Pirates finished 19-10, 13-8 in Jayhawk Conference play, and were bounced out in the region quarterfinals after a loss to Hutchinson.

The Coffeyville Red Ravens football schedule has been released for their spring season.

Their season will consist of eight games against Jayhawk Conference opponents with an exception of a non-conference game against Arkansas Baptist.

The Red Ravens have four home and four away games with their first contest being on Sunday, March 28 at Hutchinson. They stay on the road for their next two contests in Dodge City on April 3, and then at Highland on April 18.

Their first home game at Veterans Memorial Stadium will be against their rival Butler. Following that game will be a home game against their lone non-conference Arkansas Baptist on May 2, and their final game in the Red Ravens' three-game home stretch finishes with Fort Scott on May 9.

Coffeyville then goes back on the road for the final time for a game against Garden City on May 15. Their final matchup will be against their Montgomery County neighbor Independence on May 23 to finish off the regular season.

Due to scheduling conflicts, six of the eight games will be on Sundays. All home games will have a 1:30 p.m. kickoff time with an exception of their game against Arkansas Baptist which will start at 3 p.m.

The Kansas High School Activities Association Board of Directors has approved for the proposal of an "alternative fall season".

If approved, high school activities that were canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic would be able to resume March 1.

State meets, tournaments and playoffs would not occur for these fall activities, however.

All spring activities would be pushed back to March 28 and would end mid-June.

Coaches and players across the state were saddened by the news that they would be unable to participate in fall activities. This sparked a statewide movement of #LetThemPlay to spread which helped move the needle on the issue.

The proposal will be voted for approval this Friday by the KSHSAA Board of Directors.

USD 259 decided it's too dangerous to allow its students to convene in class, and as a result, there will be no sports for Wichita Public Schools. They determined that the district is in the "orange" which would disallow students from grades 6-12 to have in-person classes. The orange level is a result of Sedgwick County having a 10%-14.9% positive case rate of COVID-19 over a two week period.

On Tuesday, the Wichita City League determined that its schools would only play games against other Wichita teams, but that rule is overwritten by USD 259's decision made Thursday night.

Wyandotte County had already canceled its fall activities last week.

Kansas State received approval on Monday from the Riley County Commission to open Bill Snyder Family Stadium to approximately 25 percent capacity this fall for Wildcat football games. 

Face coverings will be required to be worm over their mouths and noses in order to enter the stadium and continue wearing them inside. Fans are being asked to provide their own face coverings as K-State will not provide them at the stadium.

Tailgating in parking lots controlled by K-State Athletics and satellite lots operated by Kansas State University groups will be prohibited to reduce the risk of large gatherings. Parking lots will open in conjunction with stadium gates two hours prior to kickoff and fans will be encouraged to immediately enter the stadium once they are parked. Re-entry into the stadium is prohibited.

Hand sanitizing stations will be located throughout the stadium as well as signage to encourage social distancing. Employees will be required to wear protective gear.

On the positive spin of things, beer and wine will be available for purchase for the first time ever in the general seating sections.

The Kansas City Chiefs will celebrate their Super Bowl LIV title and take on the Houston Texans in the NFL’s season opener in front of a reduced crowd at Arrowhead Stadium.

The Chiefs have announced a plan allowing 22% of stadium capacity to attend upcoming home games. Single-game tickets for the first three matchups will go on sale to season-ticket holders Aug. 24 by tenure and will be sold in grouped pods of seats. Season-ticket holders will be able to purchase as many as six seats in a pod.

The team says fans will be required to wear a mask at all times while at the stadium, except for when they are “actively eating or drinking.” All staff working home games will be directed to wear personal protective equipment.

The first game of the season is September 10th.

The MIAA has announced that fall sports competitions will be suspended until January 1^st, 2021 as a result of the COVID-19 Global Health Pandemic and the NCAA announcement to cancel Fall National Championships.

The MIAA said they will continue to explore the possibility of a limited number of competitions in football, volleyball, men’s soccer, and women’s soccer in the spring, as permitted by the NCAA. All athletically related activities, including in-season practices, out-of-season practices, weight training, team meetings, and voluntary workouts shall be permitted based on each institution’s ability to comply with the NCAA Policy regarding the requirements for each division to conduct non-competition activities.

The MIAA will delay a decision on the winter sports competition schedule until October 1^st at the latest.

High school sports and activites in Oklahoma will continue as originally planned.

The Oklahoma Secondary School Activities Association Board of Directors took no action during its meeting Wednesday, deciding that there was no information in the data provided that would warrant a change to the schedule.

If there is to be a change made, there is still a possibility to move fall sports and activites into the spring season. However, the board did not give any information on what it would take to trigger such a change.

Football practice officially started Monday for Oklahoma high schools. Softball, fall baseball and cross country started their seasons Monday as well.

The Big 12 announced its intention to continue with the 2020 football season, becoming the third Power 5 conference to do so.

The conference's board of directors met on Tuesday, only hours after the Big Ten and Pac-12 conferences announced that they would be suspending fall sports until 2021. The ACC and SEC have already announced their intentions to play. Outside of the Power 5, the American Athletic Conference is still planning on playing, and the Sun Belt conference is expected to follow in the SEC's footsteps. The Mountain West and MAC have already suspended their seasons. Conference USA, which has already had one team postpone fall sports (Old Dominion), will meet Wednesday.

The conference will stick with its previous schedule of nine conference games and one out-of-conference opponent.

KDHE Secretary Dr. Lee Norman says he believes sports are likely to fail in the fall due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

There have been 63 sports-related cases of COVID-19 in Kansas since the start of the pandemic. Norman said that the number doesn't seem like a lot, but there are fewer sports in the summer than in the fall. He also said there have been cases in all sports that have had a season over the course of the pandemic. This includes sports that officials believed had "natural protection" against the virus, such as baseball and softball.

Norman said he thinks KSHSAA's recent decision to continue on with fall sports as planned will be a problem as cases continue to be called in. He said there will be "fits and starts" caused by rising case counts. Norman continues to advocate for masks as the number one way to protect oneself against the virus.

There have been a few sports-related cases of COVID-19 in southeast Kansas. Most recently, USD 446 in Independence reported a student tested positive after participating in a voluntary summer weights and conditioning program.

The Big 12 Board of Directors on Monday night announced a 10-game schedule with 9 conference games and 1 non-conference game. No start date was announced as of last night, but the board said it would anticipate starting sometime in mid to late September. 

The conference's championship game is scheduled for December 5th, but there is flexibility for the conference to move that game to December 12th or 19th if necessary. Big 12 Commissioner Bob Bowlsby stressed the need to be flexible to combat any challenges that lie ahead but commended university presidents and chancellors, athletics directors, coaches, medical advisors and administrators that collaborated to get the conference to this point.