The Saline Reporter
A Heritage Newspaper
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Saline coaches unhappy
Scheduling, team support issues in play with new alignment
By Jerry Hinnen, Staff Writer
PUBLISHED: April 5, 2007
"I'm not happy," said Carol Melcher, head boys' golf coach, whose team will now have to wait until spring 2008 to defend its state title from last fall.
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"I feel like (the golf teams) have just been a pawn in all of this. We'll have to redo everything we've done with our scheduling. No, I'm not happy."
Other shifts include volleyball moving from winter to fall, girls' basketball from fall to winter, and boys' tennis from fall to spring.
Saline girls' basketball coach Jason Pickett said he wasn't surprised by the decision, but that he was likewise worried about what it would mean for his program.
"I've enjoyed coaching in the fall. I was sort of holding out hope it wouldn't come to this," he said. "I don't think we'll know the full ramifications of this for a while. But we don't have a choice. We'll have to embrace the change."
One worry for Pickett is that with both the girls' and boys' basketball seasons running concurrently, interest in the girls' team would decline.
"You're going to be asking people to come watch basketball three, four, five times in a week," he said. "The biggest thing is that you don't want girls' basketball to become, in effect, a JV sport next to the varsity boys. I do think Saline is very supportive of its teams and that there's room for support of both girls' and boys' basketball."
For tennis coach Andy BeDell, the biggest problem is having to wait until spring 2008 for his girls' team to build on the momentum of their successful 2006 season.
"It's an 18-month gap," he said. "That's a long time. I can understand why those parents worked for it, but for me, there's nothing good about it. I don't see really see why we had to be part of it."
Melcher expressed similar confusion, but noted that her team would find a way to make the adjustments.
"It is what it is," she said. "It will give us more time to get ready. And we're going to take advantage."
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