Arkansas’ high school football teams still have another seven weeks before they play the first game on this year’s schedules, but there are already possible plans in the works for future seasons.
Schools throughout the state will have the opportunity to vote on a proposal that could mean an earlier start to football’s regular season when the Arkansas Activities Association holds its annual meeting of the governing body Aug. 6 at the Statehouse Convention Center in Little Rock. If this proposal passes, teams will begin their 2016 season — the inaugural season for the new Bentonville West High School — on the week of Aug. 22-27 instead of the following week.
At a Glance
When Do They Start?
Arkansas’ high schools will vote on a proposal Aug. 6 that, if passed, would move the start of football season one week earlier, beginning in 2016. The following is when each state and the District of Columbia will begin its 2014 season, according to the respective state’s high school athletic association.
Aug. 11-15 — Alaska, Vermont
Aug. 18-22 — Alabama, Colorado, Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri*, North Carolina, South Carolina, Wisconsin
Aug. 25-29 — Arizona, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia, Wyoming
Sept. 1-5 — Arkansas, California, Delaware, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Oklahoma, Oregon, Washington
Sept. 8-12 — Connecticut
*Missouri moved its season one week earlier beginning this year.
It’s something that caught the Arkansas Football Coaches Association, a group with more than 600 members throughout the state, totally off-guard, and it’s one that many coaches don’t like. Bentonville coach Barry Lunney said he was disappointed over the possible move, and he said he had received numerous phone calls earlier in the week from colleagues in the state’s larger classifications who expressed their disappointment over the issue.
“I don’t like it at all. I don’t think it’s a move that helps football,” Springdale High coach Shane Patrick said. “The number one thing it does is, it doesn’t help kids. Basically, it’s going to eliminate a week of football, and that’s not a good thing.
“More importantly, it’s going to push everything back in the heat, which is not safe for kids. We’re going to move football up a week and create more time during those times to play games, and you have to play those games in excessive heat. I think it’s just a bad thing.”
This proposal comes as a result of a spring survey the AAA provides to school administrators and principals. Any item that receives more than 60 percent approval by those voting on the survey is moved on as a proposal for schools to vote on during the governing body meeting.
It was then reviewed by the 19-member AAA board of directors during its summer meeting, which was held June 11. It was there that the proposal was given a “do pass” recommendation.
“I think one of the reasons for the proposal is the fact that the kids are already in school,” AAA executive director Lance Taylor said. “School is starting earlier and earlier each year, and a lot of that is because there is so much more testing these days. Football gives schools an opportunity to get their community involved.”
El Dorado coach Scott Reed, who serves as AFCA president, said many coaches in the organization didn’t know about the proposal until it was announced during its annual coaching clinic held two weeks ago in Conway. Many of them felt as if they had been blindsided, and they quickly went on the defensive.
Reed announced his disapproval of the proposal in a letter that was sent out June 30 to its members, and he said he was “anxious to talk to other coaches about it” as El Dorado participated in the Southwest Elite 7-on-7 Classic at Shiloh Christian this weekend. The group also used its Twitter account to remind its members to get with their respective school’s voting representative and have it defeated.
“We don’t know where the proposal came from,” Reed said. “But I know it didn’t come from a football coach. That’s why we didn’t waste any time getting the word out.
“I see nothing positive out of this. When we sent out the letter, the feedback we have received is 100 percent against this passing.”
Safety Concerns
Player safety, a hot topic among all levels of football in previous years, was the first thing coaches mentioned when they spoke against the proposal. While the regular season will begin one week earlier if the proposal passes, teams won’t be allowed to begin their formal preseason workouts earlier, meaning they will start on the first Monday in August — which will be Aug. 1 in 2016.
If the season begins one week earlier in 2016, it would give teams only four weeks of practice before their first game, and teams aren’t allowed to do anything in full pads until the first Saturday of August. Another proposal that will be voted on in August would restrict teams to three days of full contact per week, including their Friday night game, if it’s passed.
“That will cut us down to nine practices in full pads before we send them out there in a game situation and have them compete on a high level,” Fort Smith Southside coach Jeff Williams said. “We’re going to send kids out there that are not prepared.”
Reed’s letter to his AFCA colleagues points out that college teams are allowed 29 practice opportunities prior to their first game under NCAA guidelines, including only two days in shorts and helmets and two more days in shorts, helmets and shoulder pads. He said the earlier schedule, and the cut in number of formal practice sessions, would be a step back from the progress they have made toward heat illness, in which coaches nationwide celebrated having an entire year without a heat-related casualty.
Meanwhile, Taylor said players shouldn’t be affected by the earlier start of the season because of the additional work they put in during the offseason, whether it be on the field or indoors.
“The kids are already in shape,” Taylor said. “They are already lifting weights in the summer, and there is so much 7-on-7 football going on these days. If the season doesn’t start a week sooner, where do you think that kid will be at 7 p.m. that Friday? He’s probably going to be practicing.”
Reed, however, was quick to point out that he would rather start later than sooner.
“We start practicing early enough, and the kids need their summer to do some things,” he said. “Playing 7-on-7 football is great and so are the camps that we have. But for a full game in pads, that takes preparation, especially when you are dealing with some of the smaller schools that have players go both ways.”
Playoff Perils
There’s speculation by some coaches that the proposal was brought up after what happened during last year’s state playoffs, when inclement weather that hit the state during the first week of December caused all the playoff games that weekend to be pushed back.
As a result, the championship games in Class 2A through Class 4A finals were played on the final weekend before Christmas.
“I would hate to find out that this was brought about by some knee-jerk reaction,” West Memphis coach Billy Elmore said. “It was unfortunate that it happened, but I’ve been in some championship games before in December when I was sweating.
“I can tell you this much: Arkansas has never lost a football player in December because he was too cold or developed frostbite. We might not know what the weather is going to be like in December, but I can guarantee you what it’s going to be like if we have to play those early games in August. It’s going to be hot.”
Taylor pointed out that the move will allow Arkansas to start the season on the same week as a majority of the other states. Approximately 32 states begin a week earlier, including Texas, Louisiana and Missouri.
Reed, however, said the move would eventually hurt high school football in the state on a financial standpoint. It means the playoffs would also begin one week earlier, and the championship games for Class 5A through Class 7A would fall on Thanksgiving weekend — a major weekend for college rivalry games such as Arkansas-Missouri, Alabama-Auburn, Mississippi State-Ole Miss and LSU-Texas A&M.
“Thanksgiving weekend, did anybody ask us what our gates are on playoffs,” Lunney said. “We have a pretty good following here, and it was that way at Southside. People are gone on Thanksgiving weekend.
“It’s one of our weakest gates, even during the playoffs. So now we’re going to make that the finals weekend? If we are looking at revenues, which we hear about all the time, I don’t think that’s the best weekend to have a finals weekend. December has always been a wonderful time.”
Other speculation could be turned toward basketball, particularly when it comes to those schools in smaller classifications. The longer those schools’ football teams remain in the playoffs, the more basketball teams must wait to get some players and get their season started.
“I’m sure this has something to do with basketball, and I understand that,” Fountain Lake coach Tommy Gilleran said. “If I was a basketball coach, I would probably feel the same way.
“In the past couple of years, our season went on until the second week of December. That practically takes a whole month away from basketball, then basketball teams start running into more problems when they start calling games off because of weather.”
Alma coach Doug Loughridge saw what basketball teams had to endure when he was at Charleston. The Tigers won two state championships while he was there, which meant basketball had to be put on hold during those seasons.
A better solution, according to Loughridge, would be to shorten the state football playoffs.
“They are so watered down right now,” Loughridge said. “We have these No. 5 seeds and teams that have 1-9 or 2-8 records that go to the playoffs.
“They make these 4-hour drives for a game, and you know what the outcome is going to be before they play the game. What the AAA needs to do is cut out some of these teams and cut out some of those games.”