Football and other outdoor sports will be permitted in Santa Clara County beginning Friday, officials announced Monday, bringing the county in line with recent guidelines released by the California Department of Public Health.

Outdoor sports got the green light in many parts of California in revised guidelines released last Friday, but while Santa Clara met the requirements laid out by the state, county officials only committed to implementing the relaxed rules for outdoor activities following further review over the weekend. On Monday, Dr. Sara Cody, the county’s public health officer, announced that a broader range of outdoor activities, including and beyond the sports affected by the state’s guidelines, would soon be allowed in Santa Clara County.

“We have been fighting COVID in Santa Clara County for over a year. We recognize the toll of the pandemic on everyone’s mental, physical, and spiritual health, and the need to balance the risk of COVID with other human needs,” Cody said in a statement. “Children and adults alike need to participate in the many activities that support their mental, physical, and social wellbeing. We know that the State has made rapid changes to its rules on athletic activities. It is important that changes are consistent across the board. We recognize the importance of all outdoor activities—athletic and non-athletic—to our health and are seeking to allow as much as we can given current levels of community transmission.”

County officials said the new rules will allow for all sports affected by the statewide order to move forward. That means any outdoor sport in the red or orange reopening tiers can begin practice and competition Friday. Football, baseball, softball, soccer, lacrosse, water polo and rugby were all among the sports to receive good news last week and can now breathe easier knowing there won’t be any stricter local orders in Santa Clara County.

All state guidelines allow local health authorities to implement tougher restrictions, and Santa Clara County has become known as one of the most restrictive locales in the country. It has previously had to rescind a rule that required 25 feet of distance between competitors following public outcry. Earlier this month, the California Interscholastic Federation said student athletes could compete on multiple teams at the same time, but Santa Clara County kept the single-cohort restriction in place.

When the announcement came Friday, Santa Clara suddenly became the state’s most populous county where outdoor sports would soon become eligible to compete again under the state guidelines. More populous locales in Southern California haven’t yet met the threshold, which requires an adjusted case rate of 14 or fewer per 100,000 residents.

In the Bay Area, no other local health department has indicated it will implement stricter guidelines for outdoor sports than what was announced last week by the state, and almost every county should be eligible to return to play on Friday. The only counties in the region to not meet the case rate threshold of 14/100K, according to data provided by the Department of Health and Human Services on Friday, were Contra Costa and Solano counties.

When Blake Chase saw the message from his coach last week that he might soon be back in pads for the first time since last spring, the junior Palo Alto football player broke into tears of joy. It was such a powerful reaction his parents couldn’t help but share with his coach, Nelson Gifford.

That, however, came Friday morning. Once Chase realized the fate of his season still had not been decided, the initial excitement faded. But, like Gifford, his coach, he just kept preparing like he’d be in pads later this week. In the end, the wait paid off.

“Think about the emotion that these kids put in and invest. At the end of every football season, there are tears,” Gifford said. “End of math class? No tears.”

When football looked like a long shot last month and high school careers may be over, some Palo Alto seniors began slowly dropping off the players’ group chat on Snapchat, Chase said. Since the state’s announcement on Friday, they have slowly been popping back in.

“It’s just like a whole new restart,” Chase said.

Los Gatos senior Sean Maguire hasn’t played since he injured his neck at the end of the 2019 season. He was forced to miss the Wildcats’ postseason run and eventual win in the Central Coast Section championship. He still feels the nerve pain in his neck, but he said he’s added 40 pounds of muscle in preparation for a final season that appears to have finally arrived.

“For so long, we were doubting what’s going to happen because every month, we hear worse news,” Maguire said. “Finally, to get something like this, our entire team was just so happy.  … This week, especially, we’ve been having more hope than we had the rest of the year.”

In the Blossom Valley Athletic League, which is home to 24 schools in Santa Clara County, the football season will start the weekend of March 18-20, commissioner Bill Murray said Monday. He said water polo and field hockey would begin league competition on March 15, although schools could schedule non-league games a week earlier.

A league with 24 Santa Clara County schools and three divisions is not going to worry about championships with a limited schedule. Murray said they plan to end the football season on April 17.

“If we get them out on the field, out on the courts that is a win for this year,” he said. “Just give them some kind of closure to the year.”

The Santa Clara Valley Athletic League will also begin competition in football and other Season 2 sports the week of March 15, with official practices set to get under way Monday. They will play until the 23rd, except for football, which will end on the 17th.

Commissioner Brad Metheany, whose 14 schools all lie within Santa Clara County, said the delay has only added to the headache of getting kids back on the field in a shortened timespan. Safety protocols, scheduling and facilities were all impacted by the county’s hesitation to implement the new rules, Metheany said.

The new rules in Santa Clara County will take effect Friday, the same time the state guidelines go into place. The county said the new rules would be posted to its website within the next few days.

Staff writer Elliott Almond also contributed to this report.