I was already tired of Arizona baseball coach Andy Lopez. No one has been more vocal or whined more about the new uniform start date than he has. While it is too bad his student-athletes have to suffer through road trips and watch their academics slide, what about those student-athletes on teams in the Northeast and Midwest who spend the last week of February and all of March traveling to the South?
There are two sides of the issue and thankfully Mark Schlabach eventually gets to that in his article, which is clearly slanted to the southern teams. If Arizona State can find a way to schedule so many games early without traveling, how is it that Arizona can't? In the past I have been somewhat sympathetic toward Arizona and Arizona State since there are not many schools in close proximity, but maybe its time to add a tournament or two in February and March and play four games in a weekend so you don't have to play as many midweek road games.
I wish ESPN.com and the national media would quit quoting coach Lopez.
It would be great to see the season pushed back a couple of weeks more as Wichita State coach Gene Stephenson suggests.
"The season still needs to be moved back further in the year," Stephenson told Schlabach for the article. "We're still playing half of our season when basketball is going on. We're never going to become a major sport if you're playing half your season or more when basketball is the most popular."
Of course, I did sit in 95-degree heat and nearly as high rate of humidity last Saturday in Houston to watch Rice beat Texas A&M. But it sure beat sitting in 30-degree temps in April watching the Buckeyes and Michigan play in Ann Arbor a few years ago.
Another ESPN.com article.
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