With less than a week remaining before the high school basketball postseason begins, the biggest winner recently has been inclement weather.
Area teams have been unable to gather any momentum heading into the district tournaments because of the number of games postponed or canceled the last three weeks due to icy conditions.
“It has really thrown our rhythm off big time,” Howard boys’ coach Walter McGary said. “We had found our identity and were really started to play well, but then this weather has become a big burden.
“We’ve had to cancel two games and we’ve played about four or five fewer games than we had this time last year. Not having more game experience is a concern going into a tough district tournament.”
Howard has won 14 consecutive games and will head into the District 6-AA tourney with an overall record of 21-2. The Hustlin’ Tigers will have a full week between their last regular-season game and their district tournament opener.
Two district tournaments (5-AA, 7-AA) will have begun by Tuesday, barring more weather issues, and all other area district tournaments will be in full swing by Thursday. Because seeding for district tournaments must be completed before the brackets can be drawn, several key games were rescheduled for odd times. Signal Mountain plays at Lookout Valley this afternoon, which means the host Yellow Jackets will have played four games in as many days before beginning play in the District 6-A tournament with just one day’s rest.
“It is a concern having to cram so many games in just to finish the season and then turning around and starting the district without a lot of rest,” Lookout Valley coach Joe Galloway said. “But kids are pretty resilient, so hopefully they’ll bounce back.
“Another big problem is not getting to practice. That’s the big thing this time of year, really because we aren’t getting to fine tune like we would like to.”
Postseason wrestling tournaments also were affected by Friday’s snow, forcing the Region 4 event at Red Bank to skip a day before finishing Saturday.