HURRICANE, W.Va. — A Kanawha Valley football coach believes a summer long practice opportunity would be a positive for many athletic teams.
Hurricane High School football coach Jeremy Taylor said there had always been an allowance for players who participate in other sports to miss days during the three week practice period in June and he doesn’t think that will change.
“A lot of these baseball showcases and basketball AAU tournaments are not going to change. Many of those are out of state and in June,” said Taylor. “They’re not going to change just for us.”
Hurricane is a school with a number of highly successful athletic teams. Each sport shares some of the school’s top athletes.
Under the proposed plan adopted by the SSAC Board of Control there would be a dead period during the July 4 week but the rest of the summer would be open for practice of any sports. The idea was to structure practice plans to accommodate all sports and those dual or three sport participants wouldn’t miss as much.
“In July, we’re lifting three days a week anyway, so instead of going out on the field and just running or doing agility, we’ll be able to take a football and teach a little bit,” Taylor said. “We may also be able to go out of state in July to some of the larger national competitions and not violate SSAC rules, which we could not have done in the past.”
Taylor said the change will be a bigger benefit to schools in Kanawha and Cabell counties who were hurt last year when the county started school early in August. The early start clipped the traditional two-a-day practices. Under the present guidelines, the pre-season football drills could start at any time without pads and help those teams recapture some of the time lost.
The proposal still faces a public hearing and the approval of the state Board of Education.