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| The Daily News
The Coastal 8 1-A/2-A Conference has formulated a scheduling plan that not only follows the NCHSAA’s amended calendar amid the COVID-19 pandemic, but also allows athletes to participate in multiple sports during overlaps.
The league also decided to have its football teams play one another once for the allotted seven games, while all other team sports will play a home-and-home format against all league teams for the allowed 14 contests.
“For us, it was an easy situation with us having eight teams in the conference,” Richlands athletic director Mike Kelly said. “We don’t have to struggle to find anyone else.”
There will be no conference tournaments for basketball or volleyball, although individual tournaments, such as in wrestling and tennis, can be held.
“The overall concept of the conference as to why we play high school sports is that so kids have the opportunity to compete,” Dixon athletic director Brandon Ball said. “We want to make sure what they are experiencing now is the best it can be.”
The league decided to hold volleyball matches on Tuesdays and Fridays until the week of Jan. 4-8, when basketball games tip off. Then, basketball games will be held on Tuesdays and Fridays while volleyball games will be on Mondays and Wednesdays.
The volleyball regular season is scheduled for Nov. 16 to Jan. 8 with the playoffs beginning Jan. 12. The basketball regular season is set for Jan. 4 to Feb. 19.
“It’s pretty important to have those girls for the volleyball playoff games,” Ball said. “But with playoff seeds determined by conference finishes, we also want them to be able to play basketball, too. It’s not like it was before where if volleyball ran deep, you could miss some nonconference games.”
There will also be an overlap between basketball and football. The football regular season kicks off Feb. 26, the same week as the start of the basketball playoffs, although postseason dates have been scheduled by the NCHSAA to not conflict with football.
The first three rounds of the basketball playoffs are Feb. 23, 25 and 27.
“We were all pretty unified about not splitting divisions and having it be about the kids having the opportunity to play multiple sports,” Southwest AD Eric Kliewer said. “A kid could be playing basketball playoff games on Tuesday and Thursday of that week and then a football game Friday night. The coaches will have to work with each other to make this happen.”
The scheduling template for cross country has five dates with two different meets of four teams scheduled on the same day. The golf schedules are still being worked on.
Sports where multiple teams compete with one another are limited to just four squads at a time per contest per NCHSAA regulations.
“We have three things that we have tabled until our next meeting,” Croatan AD Dave Boal said. “In golf, are the courses able to handle all the tee times or will we have to split girls and boys? And we are not sure yet about the wrestling schedule.
“But we have time in these sports. The important thing was getting volleyball right, knowing we will have to play games during the Christmas break.”
Boal said the league will also look into other concerns.
“We don’t know if we will be allowed to have fans in or sell concessions,” he said. “And we don’t know how many kids will be allowed on the buses. So we tried to spread out games so if we needed more than one bus, we could handle that. But, if we get rain, that will throw a wrench into everything.”
Chris Miller can be contacted via email at chris.miller@jdnews.com or by calling 910-219-8472. Follow him on twitter @jdnsports.
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