Spring sports in the Upper Valley face one of the biggest challenges of the season within its first week of preseason: the snowy remnants of winter. Rhetoric through the first few weeks of spring training involves a coach’s battle with a cold, damp field and a team’s desire to practice anywhere other than inside a gymnasium.
Coaches and high school officials thought this year would be different. Winter came and went with little fanfare. Spring teams took advantage and spent time outdoors as temperatures last week reached 60 or higher. Coaches and athletes alike thought they had lucked out. Spring, they hoped, had simply come early.
And then Monday dropped daylong snowfall. Someone spoke too soon.
“This year was the first time we were outside on day one,” said Woodstock athletic director Justin Wardwell. “Spring training started two weeks ago. I don’t think we’ve ever been outside on day one. Today (Monday) notwithstanding, our fields are in great shape.”
It’s an annual tug of war between coaches’ preseason plans and the availability of a high school’s athletic facilities. On the one hand, coaches are tasked with putting together schedules in order to get athletes ready for an upcoming season. Most, if not all, of that training involves repetitive practice and drills, a formula that also gives coaches a better idea of what type of team they’ll be coaching.
On the other hand is a soggy, muddy field recuperating from a long winter, leaving it particularly suseptible to damage done by repetitive use. In the end, damp fields keep spring teams indoors for much longer than most coaches would find ideal.
“There’s only so much you can do in the gym,” said Mascoma High athletic director John Kelly. “It gets repetitive. Sometimes you lose the kids’ attention. It becomes a real effort to develop any skills (for baseball or softball) inside.”
Lebanon softball coach Kassie Dunkerton, a Raiders alumna in her first spring at the helm, expressed a similar frustration during a Monday afternoon practice inside Lang Metcalf Gymnasium.
“(The field) wasn’t bad on Thursday,” Dunkerton said. “There’s a swamp in left field, but we avoid it. Hopefully, the snow won’t soak it up again. I was really looking forward to, when two weeks ago it was 70 degrees, like, ‘Sweet, we’re going to be outside earlier than ever before.’ That didn’t happen.”
This year’s light winter has certainly put fields in better shape than in years past. Where coaches and officials have had to concentrate on getting them ready for season openers, this season the emphasis is elsewhere. The sense, or perhaps the hope, is that fields will naturally dry up as winter gets its last bit of attention and spring emerges.
“We’re a little ahead of schedule,” said Sunapee athletic director and baseball coach Tom Frederick.
The Lakers’ baseball field is notorious for draining poorly, to the point where all Sunapee home games are scheduled for the second half of the season.
“Our field is one where the sun has to land directly on it from out of the sky for it to really dry,” Frederick noted. “After (Monday), we’re probably set back a week and a half.”
Mascoma High’s baseball and softball teams have been outside for at least a day or two, but Monday’s snow forced them back inside. Still, Kelly said, this year puts his facilities in a much better position to be ready sooner.
“Maybe four years ago, we were outside a little early, but it was such a mild winter,” Kelly said. “We typically spend two weeks in the gym and hope to be on the field by April vacation. We did beat that by quite a bit.”
Stevens AD Doug Beaupre echoed a similar sentiment, saying his teams had been outside practicing for “a while” before Monday’s snow. Hartford AD Joe James also said his teams were able to practice outside last week, though not at the Maxfield Complex. The Hartford Parks and Recreation Department is holding off on allowing teams on the fields just yet, James said, and a meeting early this week will determine when they open up. Teams have been practicing on Hartford’s campus for the time being, with boys lacrosse at the Ottaquechee School and girls lacrosse at the Dothan Brook School.
Hanover baseball has had limited practices outside last week, while the Marauders’ softball team hasn’t left the gym.
“We have to be out there,” said first-year Hanover softball coach Jessica Belley. “The gym is so anti-climactic. It’s crazy that we’re inside.”
But this week’s weather could create more problems. Forecasts suggest another round of rain later on this week, and temperatures in the 30s for days without rain. As spring sports season begins this week, it’s hard to determine which fields will be ready on time and which will need more work.
One thing’s for sure — coaches are enjoying the head start.
“The nice thing is we haven’t had our guys using the lacrosse field,” Wardwell said. “We’ve been using the lower field to practice. In years past, we haven’t had a choice. … We probably would have been out there (Monday). We’ll push it back now, but we’re in pretty good shape.”
Josh Weinreb can be reached at jweinreb@vnews.com or at 603-727-3306.