The Emmaus High School boys basketball team completed its 2020-21 condensed regular season schedule a little over two weeks ago and has been preparing for the District 11 Class 6A Tournament ever since.

With the Coronavirus causing the basketball season to be shortened this year, senior Danny Bohman and his classmates look at this year as a blessing still to be able to play one game.

“This season has easily been the most unique year of basketball I have ever been a part of,” said Bohman. “And I feel like I speak for everyone on that one. Every single practice and game had to be utilized because we never knew if the next day was a guarantee or not.

“It was a lot different for us seniors because we have been together since almost the fourth grade. It felt a little nostalgic to be around my brothers for one last season. We felt comfortable playing together like we never left each other in the first place, which made me really happy to be able to play our senior year.”

Emmaus play mainly Eastern Pennsylvania Conference games against teams from their division, including Allen, Central Catholic, Dieruff, Parkland and Whitehall. They did not schedule many nonconference games, outside of one at Salisbury. But the program was happy to be together and be around the sport that brings them joy.

“Even though our regular season is over, we are taking everything day-by-day because we knew that we would look back on this year and want it to be memorable,” said Bohman. “Even with a shorter season, all the boys have been really good about not messing around and focusing on our objective, which is to have fun and perform to the best of our abilities.

“This year will always be remembered as the year of COVID for us. We will remember it as the season that wasn’t supposed to happen, but we were fortunate enough to be around people we love, playing the sport we all love collectively.”

The Green Hornets concluded their regular season campaign with a 3-8 overall record. They open up districts as the number nine seed and hit the road to take on the eighth seed, Liberty, in the opener.

“We are looking forward to just continuing our grind from the regular season and working together to make this last as long as we can,” said Bohman. “We are hoping to surprise some people who may doubt or look past us.

“The team has been in the gym every single day for three-hour practices and overall, we have shown that we are a better team just in practices. I have been able to practice and I’m hoping we are able to perform well for the rest of the season.”