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As we approach the final week and a half of high school football, the country continues to be in an even stronger coronavirus grip. We have seen in the fall that many games never got played, that teams were forced to bow out of the playoffs, and that administrators battled with what decisions to make week in and week out.
Now that the football season is ending, it’s time to move indoors, which presents even greater challenges. With those challenges in mind, the Colonial League, East Penn Conference, and the Patriot League all announced their plans for the winter season with mitigation plans in mind. Here are the results of those meetings:
The Colonial League
With 12 teams that wrestle and 13 that play basketball, each team will play or wrestle all other teams one time.
The first scheduled basketball games will be played on 12/11/20 with wrestling starting the following day. There will be no games from 12/24/20 through 1/10/21. The schedule will pick up again on 1/11/21.
The EPC
The Conference will be divided into three divisions:
Lehigh: Allen, Central Catholic, Dieruff, Emmaus, Parkland, and Whitehall
Monroe: ESNorth, ES South, Pleasant Valley, PM East, PM West, Stroudsburg
Northampton: Bethlehem Catholic, Easton, Freedom, Liberty, Nazareth, Northampton
Wrestling – The schools will wrestle each team in their division twice for a total of 10 contests.
Basketball – Each basketball team would play each divisional opponent three times for a total of 15 games.
Much like the Colonial League, the basketball season begins on 12/15/20 and wrestling begins the following day. There will be a schedule shutdown from 12/24/20-1/14/21.
The Patriot League
The Patriot League will be composed of three mini-conferences for both the men and the women, established by geographical locations:
North: Army, Boston University, Colgate, Holy Cross
Central: Bucknell, Lafayette, Lehigh
South: American, Loyola Maryland, Navy
Each team will play 16 games playing each conference opponent four times with Lafayette adding two games against American and two games against Boston University in order to complete a 16-game schedule. Each team will play an opponent on back-to-back Saturdays and Sundays. No weekday games are scheduled.
Games will begin on 1/2/21 and go through 2/21/21 with no breaks scheduled.
As was the case in the fall, the major concern is to keep everyone as safe as possible while allowing competition to go on. Time will tell if that is at all possible.
ABOVE THE EARS (SOME MUSINGS)
- I thought I was watching Tin Cup on Sunday when Tiger Woods took a 10 on the 10th hole at Augusta National. He hit into the water three times and put his highest score on his card ever. In a Masters practice round, Jon Rahm showed everyone how to play the water:
- Dustin Johnson, who does not have the most sparkling personality, but does have one of the greatest golf games right now, managed to make the Masters a rather dull affair. I’m sure CBS was hoping that someone would challenge Johnson before the NFL games began and, early on, it looked like that would happen. But by 1:00pm, when kickoffs were happening across the networks, Johnson held a commanding lead and never wavered. I wonder how many switched the dial.
- Wow – the Eagles looked awful on Sunday. 0-9 on third down is incomprehensible; Carson Wentz is overthrowing everybody; the defense made very few plays; and coaching decisions were hard to justify. The Eagles play Cleveland, Seattle, Green Bay, New Orleans, and Arizona in the next five weeks and should be underdogs in every one of those games. Yikes!
- I was very excited last week when my #7 seed Wilson Warriors beat #2 seed Pottsville in the District football quarterfinals. That joy was eliminated this week when, due to Covid, the Warriors were forced to withdraw from the playoffs. So they end the season with a terrific win and a disappointing withdrawal. “The thrill of victory; the agony of defeat.”
- District playoff action comes to a conclusion this week in high school football. We think we have two really good match-ups for you on Thursday and Friday nights at 7:00 PM. Central Catholic will take on Northwestern on Thursday night for the 4A title. Freedom will play Nazareth on Friday night for the 6A championship. Nazareth is undefeated and Freedom’s only loss was to Nazareth. You’re invited to join us.
Gary’s Guesses: NFL Picks – (LAST WEEK – 9-5; OVERALL- 97-47-1 – 67%)
