The Times podcast: What California’s high school athletes can teach us about coping with COVID-19

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California’s high school athletes were bona fide ballers during the pandemic. They trained alone or over Zoom during lockdowns and are now facing off against one another on the field. How these student athletes coped with this past COVID-19 year offers lessons in resilience and ingenuity for all of us.

Today, we learn how the football team at Loyola High School in Los Angeles came together to help teammate Josh Morales and his family survive COVID-19. Then, we’ll chat with the L.A. Times’ longtime high school sports columnist Eric Sondheimer about the bigger challenges ahead for young athletes.

Host: Gustavo Arellano

Guests: Josh Morales, a senior at Loyola High School; and L.A. Times high school athletics columnist Eric Sondheimer

Further reading
Column: Football helped Loyola High senior survive as COVID ripped through his family
Lost Year: A look at the high schools’ COVID-19 pandemic shutdown in tweets