BUFFALO, N.Y. — The Canisius men's basketball team hasn't played organized basketball in over a month due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
"It's extraordinarily challenging because there's a lot of questions with the answers being, I don't know," said head coach Reggie Witherspoon.
The Golden Griffins are one of the top impacted schools in the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference.
"Coach, when's our next game? That's usually not a question that you would get as a coach," Witherspoon said.
Their last taste of action came January 2 against Saint Peter's and since then it's been a struggle to keep the guys engaged. For Witherspoon, his motto is 'you can only work with what's in front of you.'
"There's so many things you can't control and if you spend too much time on those you'll miss some of things you have an opportunity to do."
That's where Canisius has had to get creative in player development, not only on the court but off it ,as well.
"We have to zoom with our team a lot," Witherspoon said. "A lot of is personal development not just basketball wise but personal development. Then some of it is individual development."
"We're having guys in the gym (that are allowed be in the gym) maybe they already tested positive," Witherspoon said. "We try and get them as much development as we possibly can."
Witherspoon, who tested positive for COVID-19 back in October, said it's hard to even prepare for anything because if there's a positive test within the team or opponent everything is a mandatory shutdown.
"If someone tests positive in tier one then you're not allowed to play your team is not allowed to play for 14 days," Witherspoon said. "If you compete against another team in that game and they have someone who tests positive then your team is shut down for 14 days."
That doesn't even count all the contact tracing the school will investigate to quarantine added players.
Witherspoon also made note that he believes his players and personnel are doing everything they can to limit the spread of the coronavirus. When guys are allowed to practice, coaches are wearing shields and players and other personnel all wear masks.
With a month and counting of no games and the season is winding down neither coaches or players know who they'll play next or even if they'll play again.
"The schedule changes every day," Witherspoon said.
The MAAC men's basketball schedule has been changed 110 times now.
As of now, the Golden Griffins are scheduled to play Manhattan on February 12.
There's also a physical part that weighs heavily on the players. Pre-season condition is challenging and in retrospect the team is doing that at least 10 times, if not more, because of the constant stopping and starting. The body continuously has to go through a warm up stage and get back in playing shape to stop again. Witherspoon said the players bodies will hurt for a few days, but there's nothing you can do. It creates a challenge for the players and coaches.
There's isn't any word if the Golden Griffins will face a possible shutdown, but Witherspoon did say that he would think that far into the future.
"You can only control what you can control."