Hopes deflated: Basketball rims remain down due to coronavirus restrictions

FALL RIVER – Mayor Paul Coogan takes no delight in taking the air out of the basketball in the Spindle City.

While reinstalling the basketball rims at the city’s courts isn’t his top priority, it’s something he dearly wants to do. “I’d do it in 3/100ths of a second,” he said on Thursday morning.

The rims came down in March, part of the city’s response to the COVID-19 crisis. Coogan had said a couple of weeks ago that he hoped to put the rims (aka hoops, baskets) back up on the backboards once Phase 2 of Gov. Charlie Baker’s state reopening plan went into effect, on June 8. But the rims have remained in storage. The problem, Coogan noted with a hint of frustration, is in the restrictions.

The governor’s rules do not prohibit contact sports (like basketball), just the contact. Contact sport activities, the rules state, “must be limited to no-contact drills and training exercises.”

The rims could be reinstalled, with posted notices stating the regulations. That would largely leave playing options to shooting, maybe a game of HORSE.

But, Coogan said, he knows if the rims go back up, then it won't be layup lines breaking out. It will be games, notices or not. Tough, old-school, Fall River basketball games. And that means physical contact: Rebounding battles, attempts to block shots, to steal the ball, the occasional shove to the lower back. You might even throw non-social-distanced trash talking into the non-compliance mix.

Stationing a police officer at every court is not a practical solution. Stationing anyone in authority at the courts isn’t a practical solution.

“That’s the problem,” said Coogan, who played hundreds of pickup basketball games as a youth and young adult. “We don’t have the staff to do this.”

So that means the rims remain in storage, as Coogan continues to receive texts, many from youths, asking and pleading about the rims. A hoops-hungry city turns its lonely eyes toward the rookie mayor.

But, Coogan said, the rims will stay tucked away until state restrictions are relaxed or “I figure out a way to do this.”

Email Greg Sullivan at gsullivan@heraldnews.com. Follow him @GregSullivanHN.