When the world was shut down by a global pandemic, when school was cancelled and office buildings were vacant, two siblings played 1-on-1 basketball in their driveway. Across town, a girl drowned out the world to the music in her AirPods and the beat of her feet as she ran down the road, and a boy practiced his underhand against a garage door. Sports quickly became an outlet for kids during the COVID-19 pandemic and continues to improve student’s mental health across the globe.
It’s no secret that sports have beneficial effects on adolescents’ physical and mental health. According to the National Library of Medicine, the benefits of sports in the context of teenager’s mental health is endless. From natural positive endorphins, decreased rates of depression and anxiety, to increased confidence levels, studies have proven time and time again the importance of youth sports. However, following COVID-19, depression, anxiety, and suicide rates skyrocketed. Are sports still the outlet they once were despite having looked different while the world was shut down? The answer across the board is yes, 100%.
High School Counselor and Varsity Tennis Coach Krista Versa shared her support for youth sports and their influence on highschoolers’ mental health specifically throughout and post pandemic.
“Sports are really good for mental health, when it comes to exercise, but also social connections. They provide a place where after the pandemic, there is building, or rebuilding communities and creating friendships.”
As a mental health professional working with high schoolers, Versa saw firsthand the impacts of the pandemic on adolescents’ mental health and the cushion sports and exercise became to soften the blow of the pandemic.
“I think it was an outlet because we were in a hard situation. People had more free time, and it was a healthy outlet,” stated Versa.
“If you’re exercising especially outdoors it can help if you are feeling stressed, struggling with depression or any kind of mental health issues as well as social skills, many people practiced or exercised together with a family member and then you had more conversations…it just helps people.”
Emmy Seven, a senior cheerleader at Eastside Catholic, was greatly appreciative to have cheer as an outlet during the pandemic. Socially, it had many benefits. Seven explained how her cheer team stayed connected through having “cheer families”, making her freshman year and the lockdown much easier on her mental health.
“I was the freshman, [my cheer family] didn’t have a junior, but we did have a sophomore and two seniors,” Emmy explained, “I had people to talk to, it was really nice.”
Photo Credit: Eastside Catholic School
Considering the severity of the pandemic and lockdown that spanned for nearly two years, many kids turned to Television, TikTok, or other screens to pass the time, however student athletes found the motivation to keep working in order perfect their sport or to simply just stay active.
As a younger athlete, Seven was inspired to continue growing her skills to ensure she had a spot on the team for the next three years. “I was a freshman and I knew eventually we were going to go back to it while I was in high school and I didn’t want to be cut because I was scared, so I just kept going.”
Versa shared how, from a mental health professional’s point of view, turning to sports benefitted kids’ mental health even if, like Seven, it wasn’t their first intention.
“It was a personal goal, working on your personal health, but then also, you know, providing hope that one day we would go back. Kids were just taking care of their physical health and almost subconsciously it gave them the hope. When I ask students how they feel after practice or a workout, nine out of ten times they feel better after, and that wasn’t even their intention.”
Not only did students report feeling better mentally after exercising during COVID, many improved their craft and gained valuable skills.
“I learn how to tumble. I got down my back handspring and some other stuff; I don’t think I ever would have done it if we didn’t go into COVID. I just spent a lot of time in my backyard tumbling,” shared Seven, who further went to explain how coaches continued to give instruction and keep the cheerleaders active and inspired.
“I feel like a lot of people on cheer spent a lot of time practicing because also we’d have to do cheer tests every week, so we had to send videos back in of us doing the cheers. People would really try to perfect that, and I feel like that kind of made us all pretty good.”
Versa, as a coach and a counselor, saw numerous differences in the students who continued with sports during the pandemic as opposed to those who dropped their athletic hobbies.
“It’s hard to tell exactly what each individual student was up to, but there were definitely some of those top performing athletes, they were practicing throughout COVID, whether it was with the coach or on their own, but they were doing something.”
Those students bounced back to their sports with ease post pandemic, she also noticed decreased stress levels in kids who reported exercising throughout the lockdown.
“Research shows that stress, it lives in our bodies. And when we move, the stress that is inside your body, it starts to dissolve,” explained Versa.
The counselor wasn’t the only one to take note of these effects. According to The American Academy of Pediatrics, “athletes who had not returned to sports post pandemic were more than twice as likely to report moderate-to-severe depression and six times more likely to report moderate-to-severe anxiety.”
Returning to “normal life” post pandemic wasn’t easy for anyone. The fear of getting sick, social barriers, as well as a lack of camaraderie were all obstacles student athletes reported as they tried to return to normal, day-to-day life. Having community through a shared sport allowed them to re-enter their communities with greater fluidity than the majority of students not involved in school sports.
The CDC conducted multiple surveys throughout the pandemic and following the lockdown to track students’ mental and physical health. The results show that youth who felt more connected to people at their schools had better mental health than those who did not, and a primary factor for many of those students who felt connected was being part of a sports team or community.
Emmy Seven recalled the vital impact cheer had on her following her return to school, “We had a lot of people in our grade who cheered and we all ate lunch with together, like a little mini family.”
Seven’s experience with cheer encapsulates what it took to be a student athlete throughout the pandemic: dedication, community, and hope. Millions of student athletes spent endless hours dedicated to their craft during the pandemic, and in response, they gained a healthy outlet, valuable skills, and a tight-knit community.
