Snowstorms Cause Trouble For Colorado Athletics

Coloradoan.com

http://www.coloradoan.com/article/20130424/HSSPORTS/304240042/Snowstorms-add-stress-sports-schedules-students-studies

Once novel and fun, the consistency of snow in April has worn out its welcome among those associated with Fort Collins-area high school athletics.

Folks made Easter bunnies out of snow, students enjoyed days off and athletic officials rolled with the punches when it came to making schedule changes.

With three straight weeks of weather-related postponements and schedule snafus, time is running out on the spring sports season. April has simply thrown too many punches.

“In springtime, you’re always at the mercy of the weather,” Rocky Mountain Athletic Director Wayne Moddelmog said. “The real issue here — the real complication — is that the snow has come so late in the season. It’s just been really, really difficult.”

Moddelmog said it has been the most difficult spring sports season since he started at Rocky Mountain 11 years ago.

Scheduling nightmares

When it comes to dissecting the difficulty, there’s more than one issue clogging up the gears.

Scheduling is the obvious one. Area teams have had to reschedule — and reschedule again — up to six events because of the late April snowstorms. With little time left in the season, players are looking at little to no practice and three to five games each week.

Area tennis teams, already burdened with making up regular-season matches after the conference tournament at Loveland High School, had to postpone that tournament by a day because of snow early this week.

That leaves even less time for teams to get in the matches necessary for regional seeding.

Poudre High School baseball coach Marc Buffington said baseball teams have until May 7 to get all regular season games in. Between now and then, Buffington said the Impalas have one open date.

“We’ll have to do some doubleheaders on Saturdays,” said Buffington, who added some of those doubleheaders may be home-and-away doubleheaders, forcing the team to play a game in Fort Collins before jumping on a bus for their next game.

The closely packed schedule increases fatigue and risk of injuries, with baseball bearing the brunt of it because of the extra strain on pitching staffs.