Football coaches will admit, with relief, the most peculiar start to a Minnesota high school football season came and went without some of their fears being realized.
The changes, affecting matters such as when the season started and how practices could be conducted, were substantial. Football conferences were replaced with a new scheduling approach.
Coaches' concerns were, in turn, elevated. Now, with the regular season's second half upon them, most coaches have found a groove. The early-season challenges, however, are not far from their minds.
The Prep Bowl, every program's top prize, will be held Nov. 13-14, two weeks earlier than normal because of scheduling conflicts at TCF Bank Stadium. Coaches voted to start the season earlier, thereby ensuring teams a full regular-season schedule and a postseason opportunity. Their decision, affecting this season only, meant no preseason scrimmage to assess their teams. Instead that Saturday — Aug. 22 — marked the season's first games.
Adding to the time crunch, national safety guidelines eliminated two-a-day practices on consecutive days.
As so often happens in high school sports, regimented coaches found adjusting to changes more difficult than did their young players.
"The kids reacted well; they don't really understand how it used to be," Champlin Park coach Mike Korton said. "It was tougher on coaches who have done things a certain way for 20 years."
Change brought consternation but also positives. New preseason practice restrictions "were good for morale," St. Michael-Albertville coach Jared Essler said. He can relate. As a senior at North Dakota State in 2004, Essler took part in the first season the NCAA eliminated consecutive two-a-day practices. "We thought we were living the dream," Essler joked.