After time away from campus over winter break, the fear at the forefront of everyone’s minds was athletes or other team personnel returning to campus with a positive COVID-19 result.

This fear turned into a reality for CCSU’s women’s basketball team and a number of other programs, leading to a complete restructure of the CCSU’s schedule.

On January 6, CCSU announced positive COVID-19 test results from “tier one personnel.”

While the team would not comment further on who the personnel was, as “tier one” person encompasses everyone the team comes in direct contact with. This includes players, coaches, athletic trainers and team managers.

The results shut down all team activities for 10 days, forcing games against Bryant to be moved to January 18 and 20. However, these dates would not hold for long.

Bryant shut down its program on January 16 for positive results. Just four days later, CCSU’s next scheduled opponent, Saint Francis U, did the same. In a span of just 14 days, three teams in the Northeast Conference had been shut down due to COVID-19 outbreaks.

“It’s something you kind of have to anticipate,” CCSU women’s basketball interim head coach Kerri Reaves said. “You don’t really prepare for it but you anticipate something like this happening. Going day by day is probably the most intelligent thing to do.”

Reaves said the quarantine does mess up the cohesion of the team, but also acknowledged the veteran core of the team making the situation smoother than she had anticipated.

“Once we did get back on the court it was like we just picked up where we left off,” Reaves said.

The team’s 10 day quarantine period came at an awkward time for the Blue Devils, who had just gotten back to campus and did not have classes or coursework to bide the time, Reaves said.

“It was a long 10 days for them,” Reaves said.

Reaves and the coaching staff were still able to keep in contact with the team during their quarantine. The team did their scouting for upcoming games and presented what they found and was able to do some film work as well.

Away from the basketball, the team played an online jeopardy game which was still competitive, Reaves said.

“We’re ready,” Reaves said following the quarantine. “We’re itching to get back out on the court.”

While the news of positive tests at the tier one level came at a surprise to Reaves, she said it was atypical for the year it has been already.

“I don’t know how to explain it,” Reaves said. “It’s just been so 2020, in 2021.”

The Blue Devils replaced their games scheduled against Saint Francis U with games against Sacred Heart.