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Friday July 31, 2020 | 12:02 PM
Shane Dunlap | Tribune-Review
Hempfield soccer players huddle before their match against Greensburg-Salem on August 23, 2019.
The start of WPIAL football is delayed along with almost all other fall sports.
WPIAL notified high school administrators on Friday that the soccer season will not begin until September 10, the regular season will be shortened to seven games, and the playoffs could look very different.
Cross country, soccer, field hockey and women’s volleyball can start their schedules on September 14.
Golf and women’s tennis begin earlier on August 24.
WPIAL Executive Director Amy Scheuneman said Thursday that the league was concerned about schools trying to balance a sports season as classes began under covid-19 conditions.
Now, the football season won’t start until Thursday after Labor Day.
“We are trying to give schools the opportunity for children to enter their building or to acclimatize online or simply to have a practice schedule during the opening of school,” Scheuneman said Thursday when the WPIAL board voted to change the start dates of fall sports.
Most soccer teams could start the regular season on September 11, the Friday after Labor Day, but WPIAL anticipates some games on Thursday to ease the officer shortage.
According to traditional start dates, golf would open the competition on August 20, tennis on August 24, football on August 28, and the remaining fall sports on September 4. Instead, the PIAA offered districts a “hybrid” option, allowing WPIAL to start one or multiple sports later.
To delay the football season, Weeks Zero, 1 and 2 scheduled matches were removed. Those weeks contained no conference matches, making them easy to cut.
However, WPIAL also chose to end the regular season a week earlier, in the event that the PIAA moves the state playoffs earlier, as expected. To accomplish that, WPIAL moved the soccer games from Week 9 (October 30) to Week 2 (September 11). Teams will play weeks 3-8 as originally scheduled.
Heat acclimatization for soccer can begin on August 10. The first practice game is September 3-4, which replaces Week 1.
All fall sports can start practicing on August 17.
WPIAL also revealed two formats of soccer playoffs, one if there are state playoffs and the other if there are not.
If there are state playoffs: WPIAL will have a group of four teams in Class 6A with the finals on November 6 or 7. Classes 5A, 4A, 3A, 2A and A will have a group of eight teams with the finals on November 13 or 14)
If there are no state playoffs: WPIAL will have only one two-round tournament and four qualifiers from each classification. The finals would be on November 6.
Class 6A would include the top four teams. Classes 5A, 4A, 3A and A would take all three conference champions and a wild card. Class 2A would take only the four champions from the conference.
This story will be updated.
Chris Harlan is a writer for the Tribune-Review Staff. You can contact Chris by email at [email protected] or by Twitter.
