Heavy rain and severe lightning forced many teams to cancel their first day of football practice.
By BOB PUTNAM and LAURA LEE
Published August 12, 2003
[Times photo: Ken Shimizu]
Lakewood cornerback Geron Turner and his teammates wait to run drills. Practice was suspended until the rain stopped.
During the past year, Pinellas County football coaches have trimmed their schedules quite a bit.
Spring practices were cut by two weeks because graduation was held earlier than normal, and two-a-day summer workouts are a thing of the past after schools moved their first day of classes up a week.
That meant practices mattered more once drills officially got under way Monday.
The only problem was the weather did not cooperate.
Heavy rain and severe lightning forced many teams to cancel practice.
"We didn't get anything accomplished today," Northeast coach Jerry Austin said.
Austin had his players gather in the locker room to wait out the storm. But the field was too soggy for workouts once the skies cleared. The players ended up running around the track before Austin sent them home.
Pinellas Park coach Luke Kademoff knew his players were not going to make it outside by noon. A third round of storms were rolling through, collecting on an already flooded practice field.
On Monday afternoon the field was barren, except for several tiny red flags marking yard lines that have not been painted because the grass hasn't been dry for days.
"I don't want any injuries," Kademoff said. "It's only one day. I'm not really worried about it. If it means losing a starter, I'd rather not practice at all."
Senior fullback Aaron Williams was a little disappointed with the rainout.
"I would rather be outside hitting somebody," Williams said.
Instead the team filled practice time in the weight room, checking out equipment, going over eligibility and finishing paperwork. The Patriots had to wait an 11/2 hours until volleyball practice ended and the gym cleared so they could walk through a few plays.
The rain didn't wash out everyone's practice. All Dixie Hollins coach Mike Morey wanted was the lightning to stop.
By 3:15 p.m., practice time, Morey got more than that. The sun even made an appearance. While the football field looked like an island surrounded by an underwater track, the Rebels used a slightly drier baseball outfield for practice. It was better than Plan B: spending almost three hours crowded in a wrestling room walking through plays.
"Today we're getting cheated, everybody is," said Morey, adding that in 14 years of coaching in Pinellas County, he's never seen a soggier first day.
Other teams, such as Dunedin and Gibbs, endured muddy fields and risked injuries to get in the necessary work.
"The only thing that slowed us down was the mud," said Dunedin coach Mark Everett, whose team waited 15 minutes for the rain to stop before taking the field. "Honestly, I'm scared someone's going to get hurt. I'm petrified of a guy turning his ankle or pulling a groin. I'd rather see a dry, fast field. The linemen want the mud. They wanted to scrimmage today. I'd rather just keep everybody high and dry."
Shorecrest, which has not started classes, has two practices a day. On Monday that meant getting soaked twice. The Chargers started at 9 a.m. in the rain, but after a flash of lightning, they moved into the gym.
For the afternoon practice, coach Phil Hayford gave his team special instructions.
"I told them no cleats," Hayford said. "Just wear your rubber overshoes and hip waders."
- Times staff writer John Schwarb contributed to this report.
