By Tim Clinton

SPORTS EDITOR

Hope springs eternal, including for spring sports.

The Washington Interscholastic Activities Association has announced that the high school spring sports state championships will go on as originally scheduled -- if schools can indeed resume May 4.

How teams and individual athletes get there will be the interesting part since the scheduled regular seasons will be all but wiped out.

The solutions as to who advances will be left to the leagues and the districts involved.

Five inning baseball and softball games were mentioned as "viable options" by the WIAA since they meet national guidelines for a complete game.

The same is the case for soccer matches only one half in length.

More events can be held in one day in those situations as well.

Golfers can play up to 36 holes per day by WIAA guidelines, or more than one match.

Tennis players can play more than one match per day as well.

Track and field meets can be combined and the normal league and district meets held.

Helping is the fact this year's state competitions are scheduled for the week after Memorial Day instead of the week of Memorial Day like normal.

Other options exist if schools return to session after May 4, but one of them is not to push the championships into June because of graduation conflicts.

Competitions would end at a lower level than state.