The School recently announced that men’s soccer will switch from playing in the fall to the winter starting next year. As a result, the winter sports teams will need to find an adequate way to share the field for practice and play..
With women’s soccer already playing in the winter, there will be three, and potentially four teams including women’s JV, using that field during the winter regular season. During the postseason and North Coast Section tournament, the winter Varsity teams, depending on how long their postseasons are, might be competing with the four spring sports teams for field space.
Athletic Director Brendan Blakeley said “At this time, the general plan is to have the HRS Athletic Field usage split evenly between the men’s and women’s varsity teams. I envision staggering the start and end times for their practice sessions, such that each team would get usage of the whole field for a certain amount of time, with the bulk of the practice day being shared between both teams.”
As far as JV is concerned, Blakeley said, “If there are JV soccer teams in the winter, they will practice on the ANBA practice field, across the street.” There was a JV men’s team this past fall, but there wasn’t a women’s JV team. “We have not had enough students interested in playing girl’s soccer recently to sponsor a JV team for the girls, and I am not sure at this time if that will hold true for next year.” Blakeley said.
Senior Riley Concannon, one of the captains of the women’s soccer team, said “Other sports shouldn’t have to suffer because the men’s team has to move. It felt like there was unused space that we could have used on the main field during the end of the men’s season that we weren’t allowed to. It feels unfair that the women’s team is just expected to share when we haven’t been treated with the same respect in the past.”
Calvin Lee, a freshman on the men’s varsity soccer team, also worries about the timing. “We will have to cram three teams into one field, which isn’t ideal… Both men’s and women’s varsity soccer are very competitive and need quality practices.” Lee said.
One of the options the Athletic Department is considering is lighting the field. Blakeley said “we are exploring all options to maximize field usage during the winter season. There is no current plan for permanent lights that would be sufficient for a game.” One of the concerns Lee brought up was the current lack of lights; “In the winter it will get darker due to daylight savings, so the amount of time we have to practice will be shorter [if we don’t have lights].
The question of how the field will be used will be answered next year, but men’s soccer’s switch from fall to winter, offers a new challenge for the team at the same time as complicating logistics. That said, the Athletics Department ultimately feels hopeful about the decision. Blakeley said, “This move will bring more competitive opportunities to the program, alleviate the challenge our students currently face of playing on both a club team and the high school team in the fall season, better align us with our peer schools, and allow for a much broader group of schools we can compete against.”