GSL should work to keep Albi functional
A little bit of this and a little bit of that.
A couple of interesting topics last week on SportsLink.
Will Greater Spokane League football teams still be playing at venerable Albi Stadium in, say, five years?
If District 81 and Mead School District have their way, yes. But just in case Albi Stadium isn’t functional at some point, new fields are presently being considered at Shadle Park and Ferris.
A field at Shadle could be used by North Central, and Lewis and Clark could play at Ferris.
There’s been talk for years about Mead School District building a multipurpose field for Mead and Mt. Spokane. The problem, aside from financing it, is finding a neutral location.
Years ago, the Kennewick School District refurbished its football field then used by Kamiakin and Kennewick, putting down artificial turf so it could be used by football and soccer teams. When Southridge opened, it meant that three schools had to jockey for time. An occasional doubleheader is played in football. Other times games are played on Thursdays and Saturdays to avoid conflicts.
Here’s my two cents: Every effort should be made by District 81 and Mead School District to keep Albi functional in whatever form that takes. In its current state, Albi offers a one-stop site for six schools – not just for football but soccer, too.
Sure, as someone on the blog stated, schools having their own fields probably would mean increased attendance and the ability for those schools to sell concessions and profit from it. There’s just something attractive about doubleheaders at Albi, going back three decades.
• Another thing. Just how to schedule games at Albi.
Some are of the belief that schools with better records offer more attractive matchups and would draw better attendance if slotted in the featured times. But since six schools use Albi, there must be some fair approach to scheduling.
You can’t, for example, ask Rogers or Shadle Park, the two schools struggling this season, to play all 4:45 games on Thursdays or all 5:30 games on Fridays.
• I’ve never met a coach who, given an opportunity, has run it up on a team. Never in my 27 years in this business.
So when I saw the final score of the Coeur d’Alene/Sandpoint game – 88-12, CdA, for those who didn’t see it – I was mildly alarmed. But I knew coach Shawn Amos didn’t intend on his team scoring 88 points.
Same with Ferris’ 61-0 win over Rogers.
Still, a few commented on SportsLink about the games and others emailed or called me.
First, no CdA and Ferris starters played in the second half. Second, you can’t tell your third- and fourth-string players not to play hard. That would be a mockery of the game and be even more humiliating to the other team.
Some would argue that Amos should have told his players to run a yard and fall down. Again, a mockery of the game. Those substitutes deserve an opportunity to play as hard as the starters.
Some would say ‘Well, Coach (Fill in the Blank) wouldn’t do that to a team.’ Well, it wasn’t Amos’ intention either. Had the starters been playing in the second half, it would be easy to draw the conclusion that he had no regard to the final score.
Amos took no pleasure in the final score.
“It (the final score) kind of took some of the joy out of it,” Amos told a Bonner County Bee reporter.
Sometimes the other team needs to put up a fight.
“I’ll take the blame for this loss,” Sandpoint coach Mike Mitchell told the newspaper. “I think we made them look a lot better than they were.”
The most interesting statistic to me from the Ferris/Rogers game was the Saxons had just 27 offensive plays. That’s at least half the plays the Saxons usually have in a game.