It doesn't make sense

Where's the concern about player safety now?

When word got out  in September that Waterloo County high school football teams wouldn't be competing for the Western Bowl, player safety was listed as the No. 1 reason.

Most of the 40 senior and junior teams would have to play three games during a nine-day period midway through the season in order to finish the season in time to send one team to compete for the Western Bowl. Coaches were concerned about the number of injuries that took place during this condensed schedule in the past.

So where is the concern now that teams competing for playoff championships will play -- you guessed it -- three games in nine days to win a title?

* * *

The teams competing next Saturday for the Waterloo County football title will have only two days to prepare for the big game.

Semifinals set  for  Tuesday -- Rez vs. Preston and Jacob Hespeler vs. Cameron -- were  pushed back to Wednesday because referees couldn't be arranged.

So the games will go Wednesday and the  victors will have Thursday and  Friday to prepare.

B Bowl combatants will also only have two days to prepare, with semis set for Tuesday and the finals slated for Friday.

* * *

If this teaching thing doesn't work out for James Hitchen, he might consider a career in motivational speaking.

The Knights junior football coach was on top of his game Thursday after his boys rallied for a last-minute 12-10 win over St. Benedict. His post-game words of wisdom were electric.

The play of the game was a 70-yard run by Mike Gardiner to set up Damon Fekete's second TD of the game. At the start of the third quarter, Gardiner was violently thrown into the scorer's table by a Saints defender, who received a 15-yard roughness  penalty on the play. Gardiner sat out the rest of the quarter and must of the fourth before asking his coach to let him back in.

* * *

The Waterloo County girls basketball semfinals are set for Saturday at Cameron Heights.

JUNIOR

Southwood vs. Jacob Hespeler, 3:30 p.m.

Bluevale vs. WCI, 5 p.m.

SENIOR

Bluevale vs. WCI, 6:30 p.m.

SJAM vs. KCI, 8 p.m.

Comments

[TheRecord]

Three games in nine days is three games in nine days. No one said the coaches don't care about the kids.

[wow]

Mark
Why is it you seem to just want to stir up the controversy. Even if there would have been a tuesday game for teams there still would not have been enough time for the winner to take part in the Western Bowl playdowns. The semis were played Thursday and the WCSSAA finals would not have been played until today. Maybe the record needs to find Josh Brown so the facts would be checked and information given would not try to make the coaches look like they don't care about the kids.

[TheRecord]

I agree completely.

[localfan]

A further note to your timely commentary is the fact that ther are 2 turf fields available for use for the games remaining. Give the teams the break to fully prepare and recover to play the game which may be the last football game they will ever play.