Juneau-Douglas Crimson Bears basketball team wins regional; district won’t let them compete for state title due to Covid policy

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The storied Crimson Bears basketball team from Juneau-Douglas High School won its regional championship, but has been informed by the District it may not travel for state championships in Wasilla, and thus will have to forfeit to Ketchikan, after Crimson Bears won 16 of their 17 games this season.

Some of the boys on the team put out a plea through the social media channels to get Alaskans who support athletics to help them convince the school board to let them travel. They said they had been played together since third grade and this is their last opportunity to play together.

The JDHS boys team is the only team in the state, the boys said, which is not allowed to play for the title.

The boys are asking people to send emails to [email protected] to influence the board to reverse its decision, which is based on its Covid-19 policy.

The selection and final decision to put the Ketchikan boys team into the finals will be made Sunday evening.

To understand how devastating it is to the team and the school, one must understand the depth of passion for basketball that exists in Southeast Alaska, and also the long reputation of the JDHS basketball program.

Must Read Alaska spoke to the team’s spokesperson, who said she appreciates the help that the Alaska community may provide to change the ruling by the Juneau School District.

40 COMMENTS

  1. Boys
    Elections have consequences.
    Your school board was elected by your parents. You have a beef with the board then find out why your parents elected them.

    • Akwhitty….. your comment addresses the heart of the matter more than most. We are harvesting that which we have sown.

      • Considering how bad systemic government election fraud is in Alaska, we are harvesting that which government has sown. Alaskan voters had nothing to do with the matter. The on-going government election fraud that is continuing to occur in Anchorage, with the illegal mail-in ballots and the illegal unsupervised drop-boxes, further proves that Alaskans do not have any say in their own elections, and haven’t for a very long time.

    • The Juneau Education Association (NEA) could put Lenin’s corpse on the school board and seemingly sometimes has.

    • Sad as this situation is, your comment speaks volumes of truth.
      Time for a real discussion of actions and consequences.

  2. It is so nice to see the school board so concerned for the kids. It is always about the kids and how they care so much but hopefully people are seeing through this now and understanding it has always been about power and how to gain more. This is a virus that kills less than a half of a percent of the people it infects. I doubt that we have many citizens left that, if needed, would storm the beaches of Normandy like the greatest generation did. We have been taught to fear, which has been the easiest way to control people throughout history.

  3. Leftists once again ruining people’s lives, and I say leftists cuz we all know who occupies school board seats. Leftists are the kind of people who are mean enough to squelch the dreams of young athletes. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity for these kids–it’ll never come again. And for what? Because someone may catch a virus that kills less people than the flu?

  4. As a former Crimson Bear, and a member of the basketball team ,this does not go down well. What kind of idiots are running the School in Juneau! This nonsense has gone on far too long.

    • As a former non-Crimson Bear, and a non-member of the basketball team (basically chopped liver here), this does not go down well with me either. Obviously, compared to yours, my opinion lacks authority due to my lack of standing in the hierarchy of high school athletic achievement. If, by your logic, Carlos Boozer’s opinion differed from your’s then your’s would be quite irrelevant also.
      .
      Like to engage in fallacy much?

      • Wayne, I remember seeing you in J.D.H.S., in the early 70’s, in’ fact you were enrolled in School there, and I can produce the evidence by a quick perusal of the Totem. Therefore you were a Crimson Bear. In the future, to lend credibility to your arguments you should begin with factual statements prior to wandering off with questions of Fallacy.

        • I stand humbly corrected inasmuch as being a mere attendee of the school makes me a Crimson Bear. As to the heart of my point, calling on one’s social or academic standing to prove the veracity of facts is a fundamental logical fallacy. Argumentum ad verecundiam.

          • Mr. Coogan, I was merely pointing out that like you being a Crimson Bear and a ballplayer, I had EMPATHY for this team who doubtless worked hard to get to State.
            I think you Sir need to have your optics checked. It appears certain key words ” trigger” you.
            BTW I am a JDHS dropout.who didn’t enjoy the privileged life that so many including you enjoyed.

          • Wayne,
            Just curious, why use the Latin term for a concept that clearly was discovered by the Greeks and stolen by the Roman’s? Are you using cultural appropriation?

    • Yessir the thought of having a school board make decisions, relative to the safety of school sanctioned activities, is (in your opinion) nonsense that “has gone on far too long.”
      You are a riot Robert.

        • They won their tournament and can travel-just not to high covid areas. The coach said it best in this article when he stated they knew they wouldn’t be going to State when AASA voted to hold it in Wasilla.
          You may think covid is nonsense but thankfully you are not in charge of anything but your lip. Heheh!

  5. Tell the boys grow up and Vote Conservative Republican, and bring along their friends to vote conservative if they want their children’s freedom respected.

    • What cave have you been living in? Parents surrendered all control of anything related to their children’s education over the last 5-decades. We are at the place we have chosen to be.

  6. Forever known as the “Covid Bears.” Good reminder to those boys and their families that this is what you get when you’re busy earning a living and allow leftists to rule your school board. That small town needs to put the Board members’ names who voted for “kids’ safety” over everything else out on public display. And their businesses can be very quiet all summer, if they have real jobs.

  7. Even if you don’t live in Juneau please send an email. The school board is made up of a bunch of leftist liberals who want nothing more than to keep our town locked down and everyone wearing masks. Our hospital is empty and recently a nursing home had 12 infections and all survived just fine. Time to end this nonsense. Let the kids play.

    • Nope. They dont need the other communities bailing them out advocating against their freedom loss. They need to fight for themselves and that’s supporting and voting for anyone other than Democrat or likeminded.
      These boys can make it their mission to live on Juneau and use their popularity thanks to their athletic abilities to make Juneau go Red starting with their generation of H.S peers as they turn 18 and recruiting their younger siblings still in Junior high and elementary schools to think Republican.

  8. Good. Maybe all involved will learn the valuable lesson that voting is a responsibility that comes with consequences. This C19 idiocy has ran its course. We’ve successfully fired the bad Orange Man, killed hundreds of local businesses making Jeff Bezos even richer and convinced millions of people that if you don’t do what the mainstream media tells you, you’ll be cancelled. Rest easy boys, you know you won but also feel good about yourselves because as a good socialist-in-training country citizen you’re sharing your win with Ketchikan. Most magnificent!!

  9. The Juneau Marxists can’t have these kids leaving the Fauci Fascist Fear Plantation and going to Wasilla where people breath freely and unencumbered.

  10. The parents of these guys should buy them plane tickets and send them to the tournament. The school district has no right to suspend the rights fo these guys because of irrational fear with no foundation in fact.

  11. Why not ignore the school board and go to the tournament anyway?
    .
    What’s the worst thing the Peoples School Board can do if parents, coaches, and players go to the tournament?
    .
    And what prevents parents from recalling school board members if they do this worst thing?

    • I suspect they would not be allowed to play even if collectively they were that stupid.
      Ketchikan has already replaced them in the State tournament.
      You think this would be an acceptable reason to recall school board members? You are daft IMO.

  12. People are still scared of this Covid-1984 BS? You got 2 choices in life: You can be controlled by your fears or you can control your fears.

  13. That’s a shame. It seems they would be able to mitigate risk adequately with testing and quarantines upon return to Juneau. Are other communities opting out of tournament? I would imagine some of the smaller schools will be too.

  14. As a JDHS graduate, a varsity athlete, a parent of a sporting child, a volunteer hockey coach and an Alaskan school board of education member, I submitted my comments in support of these students. If our school boards don’t recognize that sports are an integral part of our youth’s lives, helping them build character, strength and resilience, they should not be school board members.

    • If you think this was only a “sports” thing, you are lacking in that B of E thing IMO. School related trips and functions have many other areas besides sports but your interests go there and that has clouded your thinking (also IMO).
      Here is Superintendent Weiss on this subject today: The superintendent added that this is a decision that had been made and is not open for change. “When you start looking at public input for venting when there is no appropriate outcome of it, or not outcome possible of a change or a new decision it can become fairly unproductive.”

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