Back to Work

Black rubber pellets. A few minutes ago I dumped a whole pile of them out of my tennis shoes and onto the newsroom floor.

In locker rooms around Wichita, hundreds of high schoolers did the same after the first round of two-a-days on all of these brand new, artificially turfed football fields – complete with about 9,000 tires worth of rubberized filler. Welcome to the 21st century, Wichita!

South, Heights and Northwest practiced for the first time today on their new, school bond financed field turf. Southeast and East will have theirs in place within the next couple of weeks. Bishop Carroll also joins the club with its own privately financed field of dreams, bringing the city up to speed with many of its suburban neighbors.

A year ago the GWAL was without a single turf field. This year only Kapaun will play its home games on a natural grass field. Now that’s some quick progress!

So when storms ripped through the area in the morning hours and isolated showers persisted throughout the afternoon, it was little more than a minor nuisance. Two hours after the big rains stopped, Carroll went to work on a completely dry field...
Well, almost completely dry. By the end of their workout, a couple of Golden Eagles had already lost their breakfasts, presenting an entirely new problem for veteran coach Alan Schuckman.

“I’m not sure how you deal with that. We’ll either have to hose it off or maybe just hope it dries and flakes away.”

At South, the Titans gathered eagerly around the locked gate to Carpenter Stadium. For most, their first opportunity to sample the new carpet turned into a quick baptism by rubber pellets, as South High athletic director Michelle Kuhns instructed them to lay down on certain spots to form large letters. Visible to a birds-eye camera high above the field, the message: “Thank You, Wichita.”

Weston Shartz has been through 25 opening days as a coach. “Here’s the best thing. We actually have lines on the field. I don’t think I’ve ever practiced with all of the lines, and here we have a real football field.”

Half way across town East coach Brian Byers shook his head while discussing the weather forecast. He’ll have his turf field in a few days, but not this week when rain is expected to be part of the equation in each of the next four days. He also doesn’t have his regular practice field thanks to ongoing construction work around the campus. He’ll need to be a little creative to avoid tearing up what little grass he has to work with in the season’s first week.

Southeast is in the same boat, so to speak – counting down the days while trying to dodge rain drops. West and North will have to wait until at least next year for their fields. But, overall, today has been a big step forward for a league still several behind other parts of Kansas.

The GWAL hasn’t had a state champion since Kapaun won it in 1987. The last USD 259 representative to do it was East in 1983.

Artificial turf alone won’t win titles, but it sure won’t hurt, either. At the very least it gives a long under-served group of kids a chance to feel big time for a short time during their high school careers. That alone is worth the money.