By JOHN JAMES MARSHALL, Journal Sports
One group is trying to get to the end of the season. The other is just trying to get started.
But when it comes to high school athletics these days, both groups are facing the same problem – weather.
Not that you need to be reminded, but a week of dealing with ice and snow has been followed a week of rain that only Noah would be proud of. But building an ark is nothing compared to what soccer, baseball and softball coaches are having to deal with.
High school soccer players and coaches are among the bravest athletes on the planets because there is never good weather; they are just happy to have not-as-bad-as-usual weather.
But this latest bit of meteorological mess has upped that a few notches.
“We are used to this,” said Loyola veteran girls coach Mark Matlock. “But the toughest part is getting these district games in that you have to play to qualify for the playoffs.”
The soccer regular season ends Monday and the playoffs begin later in the week. Nothing changes like a high school soccer schedule, but the timing in this case couldn’t be worse.
“Everybody has been scrambling,” Matlock said. “The weather has been so bad that even the turf fields can be unplayable.”
Even when games do get played, you never quite know what’s going to happen.
“Even with turf fields and especially new ones like ours, it still impacts the game when you have a deluge like this,” said Adam Hester, who coaches both the boys and girls at Calvary. “The ball is harder to control, it’s harder to move downfield and harder to play like you’d like to play.”
Bad weather and/or field conditions can also balance out any competitive advantage a team may have. “Teams that are more skilled aren’t able to do what they do best,” said Hester.
Meanwhile, baseball and softball coaches aren’t worried about doing what they do best. At this point, they just want to do anything.
And there is no better example of that than at Northwood. If you want to count the number of times Falcons’ baseball coach Austin Alexander has had his team work out on the field since January 11, you can stop at zero.
As if that weren’t tough enough, Alexander is faced with the problem of Northwood High School being closed due to water pressure issues in north Shreveport. He’s happy just to see his players, much less practice with them.
“You just have to creative with what you have with your facilities,” Alexander said. “You just try to do something productive so that you can try to get better.”
There are a few schools – Airline, Loyola, Byrd and Captain Shreve, for example – that have indoor batting cages or those that are basically enclosed from the weather. Northwood’s cages are covered, but not enclosed.
“We throw bullpens in the cage, but it’s still wet in there,” Alexander said. “We got to the gym and try to do some defensive stuff. But it’s challenging for sure.”
“What have we had, 72 hours of rain with no end in sight?” said Airline baseball coach Toby Todd. “But we are fortunate because we have an indoor facility that we get to take batting practice and we get to throw (bull)pens. We don’t have to go into the gym like some schools and hit whiffle balls.”
Todd looked back at last year’s practice schedule to compare to this year. He saw that his team last year did base running, bunt coverage, individual fielding drills and had a scrimmage on this date. “This year, the freshmen hit (in the cage), the sophomores hit and the juniors and seniors hit,” he said. “That was it.”
Matlock said the weather has forced his preparation pendulum to swing in the opposite direction. Before, his team might do the majority of its work between games on the field and a little in film study, but it’s now the other way around.
“We’ve really just been in the locker room studying teams that we might have a chance to see in the playoffs,” he said. “They (the players) know we are going to be there, it’s just a matter of whether it’s inside or outside.”
In order to get in practice time, Hester and the Cavaliers rented an indoor soccer facility, but even that can be a logistical nightmare.
“Some of the kids can drive, some can’t so I’ll have to transport them,” he said. “There are boys who also can’t drive, so they have to ride along but they don’t practice until an hour later when all the boys who can drive will show up. You’d like to practice two hours with each, but you only get an hour with each. Plus you have to pay for it.”
“The kids have to learn how to practice,” Alexander said. “If you can get them to buy into that and focus on what they are doing, that helps.”
Contact JJ at johnjamesmarshall@yahoo.com