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- [00:02]
A
Dive into the dynamic world of high school sports. Whether you're a seasoned athletic director, a newcomer to the field, or simply curious to learn more about this exciting profession, this podcast is your go to resource for inspiration, education and a deeper understanding of the game changing decisions that shape the world of high school athletics. Welcome back to AD360. I'm Greg Vanderbait and as always I'm joined by my co host, Scott Rosenberg. Scott, how are we doing today?
- [00:30]
B
I'm great man, beautiful day. Excited for this episode.
- [00:34]
A
You likewise. You know, gorgeous day out here. Ready to dive in and start, start talking about the topic at hand. You know, time really flies because today we're discussing how athletic directors can be best prepared for the winter sports season. With fall sports making their way towards the back half of the season, playoffs for the fall about to get underway, a great time for ads to start their initial preparations for winter sports. So with that, why don't we go ahead and dive right in. Question for you, Scott, what is the main difference you see when you're preparing for winter seasons as opposed to spring and fall?
- [01:12]
B
There's a lot, right, obviously like facility wise and we're going to talk about that in a bit, but facility wise with at least in New Jersey and probably most of the like mid Atlantic region and a lot of the country being inside for every sport. So there become a lot of like planning logistical issues with the fact that everybody's inside as opposed to being able to spread them out outside. I think even things like every school, just about every school probably has like winter or holiday concerts that you have to think about. Seems to me that there's more breaks or vacations in the winter season than the fall season for sure. So like, what does that look like for planning games and expectations for kids and parents to be home during school vacations so they can play sports? Like those kind of things completely stick out to me. And then in tough weather states, things like early dismissals and school closings and what are your policies for those things when that happens? Hey, can you guys practice if you have, let's say an early dismissal? And can you squeeze in a practice still before the weather's going to get bad? Like, what's the policy on that? Can you come in if a school is closed for the day, but by 4 o' clock when the game's going to take place, the roads are fine? Should a game be canceled? Like, you've got to think about all those things with, let's say your superintendent, like what's the policy so those are some major differences to me. How about you?
- [03:01]
A
I think those are good ones to really kind of broach. Right? Because one, I mean, back when I was an ad, weather was rarely a case in Southern California, but. But occasionally you would come across it, you know, because out there it's. I used to always jokingly say it was fire or flood season. Right? You had one of the two. So you would get to the winter sports season and you would have those elements where you would have some certain storms that were shutting things down. And a great point that you bring up. What is your policy if school is closed? Are you able to practice? You want to make sure that you get that ironed out. Another thing that I always had to be cognizant of too, is those winter sports. One, you've got the holiday tournament piece. You know what, what are going to be the expectations of the programs? How are you going to communicate those things to the, the various parents of those programs, what the expectation levels are? But also you got to factor in finals week. You know, how are you going to approach practices for that? Ensuring that you're talking to your coaches well in advance. There's no surprises. If you have any quote, unquote, dead periods of time due to finals when, where you cannot practice, that's a big part of it. And then your biggest point was one that always resonated with me. Your facilities are limited and you have a majority of sport programs that are going to be taking place indoors. And you've got to really kind of juggle and manage to ensure that everybody's getting an equitable share of those facilities to ensure that your sport programs are properly taken care of. So there's a lot of things that you've got to really plan for in advance to prevent some, you know, drastic issues popping up or, you know, problematic conversations with coaches, families, etc. So definitely some great points that you.
- [04:39]
B
Just brought up in these tough weather states, like that communication piece. It always has to be strong and there's got to be like that chain of how does the information get out to the student athletes? How does it get out to their parents? But like, in the winter season, it just seems tends to be more often. So it's maybe even a little more important to make sure those things are in place. And for any superintendents that might be listening, I have this, like, general question, at least from my perspective. In New Jersey, you cancel school because of poor weather, because there's snow on the ground, and the superintendent has to Cancel School at 5 o' clock in the morning, 6 o' clock in the morning and make that decision, which totally understand it. But again, you have a seven o' clock game that night and it gets warmer and the snow melts and the roads are plowed and salted. Shouldn't you be able to play? Why? Why can't you? Or should you be able to come in for practice that day? Like, it's an interesting conundrum for sure, but one you got to get hammered out early on. So.
- [05:41]
A
Absolutely, absolutely.
- [05:44]
B
Equipment and facility differences, like between the seasons, what do you need to assess? Prior? What does it look like during that would be a key difference or differences for you?
- [05:59]
A
Yeah, I would say definitely the unique one. I don't know if it's necessarily unique to Southern California, because I know many, many states throughout the country aquatics start taking place during the winter season. Whether that's water polo or if you're looking at swimming, you've got to make sure well in advance that that facility itself has been properly inspected. You don't want to come across something where your pump busts or the heater goes and you've got practices that are needing to take place. So definitely from that standpoint, being proactive with your facilities, obviously your indoor facilities, like your gyms, you want to make sure you've done your diligence, checking the scoreboards in advance, making sure lighting looks good. Any of those troubleshooting things that you can do weeks to months prior to the start of the season, I highly recommend. I also think too, Scott, to your point, when you're talking about inclement weather, you know, it may sound a bit ridiculous in saying it, but you definitely got to make sure. Are there any leaks? Do you have anything that you could potentially take care of well before the season starts? Because with a volleyball court, basketball floor, you can't have any type of leak taking place because it's a safety issue. Right. So I think that the more proactive you can be in terms of the facilities themselves, then when it comes to equipment, I think it's somewhat similar to many other sports seasons, you know, because you're always going to have that rush of, did you get your orders in on time? I think that's something that you got to really kind of communicate to your coaches well in advance that they have their orders placed in time for their various equipment and apparel that they're going to need for their student athletes. And just a proactive mindset from that perspective. How about you?
- [07:43]
B
I mean, number one, in most of my experience, the only pool in a Building was that one on the roof that you would tell the freshman about, but they had to go find not as many of those, but a lot of rentals here, at least I think, for those kind of facilities. But I mean, in general, yeah, that's like such a great point. When you've got specialized kind of facilities, you really got to pay attention to, hopefully have like an aquatics director who you can put in charge of trying to help manage that kind of stuff. I mean, obviously, like the scoreboards, the bleachers. How about keys, like making sure everybody's got the right keys. Maybe they're different for inside than outside. Now you're going to have a lot more people inside your building that are outsiders, by the way. So security. Right. Like most of the time those fall sports are outdoor sports, so they're on campus people, but they're not per se in the building. Maybe volleyball here, but you've got a lot more people from the outside milling around the building. So making sure that you've secured like the athletic facility versus maybe the rest of the school building and how you manage that kind of stuff can become important. And then probably just like those fall spring sports, like, you may have more off campus, like things in the winter. So that pool, that ice hockey facility, like making sure that you've got maybe athletic trainer set up. How do you deal with athletic trainers at facilities that are not necessarily there at school? So there's some major differences that I think you need to think about and plan for as you're getting ready for that winter season.
- [09:23]
A
Great points on that front. You know, especially when you're talking about like, ATCs, you know, and being able to properly schedule them because you have various facilities throughout your town where they may be having to go to. Additionally, too, from a supervision standpoint, if you're going to have multiple contests taking place, you can't be everywhere at once. So you've got to make sure that you're really planning in advance. If you're. If you're going to need to have supervision at multiple venues, ironing out that schedule well in advance is going to save you a lot of headaches, emails, meetings, et cetera. So great point, Scott.
- [09:54]
B
Thanks, man.
- [09:56]
A
So when we're talking logistical factors, you know, when it. When to.
- [09:59]
B
Comes it.
- [09:59]
A
When it comes to transportation and travel during the winter months, what are some of the things that you need to consider?
- [10:05]
B
Again, probably a little dependent on where you are in the country, sports, where you're off campus like every day, again, you think about swimming and hockey. I had A bus for every single day because they either had a meet or a game or practice. So that was a lot different than a lot of times in the fall season when you needed buses for games, but you didn't need like a dedicated bus for practice every single day. So transportation that way, setting expectations with the community. Ice hockey, again, it may be a foreign concept to some people, but ice hockey was one where when we would cancel things, parents were used to driving through blizzards before the kids would get to high school for like club hockey. And I would cancel a practice for ice hockey. And sometimes parents would be like, what are you doing? And I would be like, we're taking a yellow school bus to the games. And they'd be like, but you don't understand, last weekend I should have drove through a foot of snow to get to some tournament at a rink like two hours away. We can't cancel. So, like understanding that the winter season transportation may be a little different than people are used to. Can kids drive themselves? That's always, that's a big one. Probably every season. But are they allowed to drive themselves? I would have to get that in order when it came to like the transportation and the logistics. Anything stick out to you and more like that, warmer weather, climate.
- [11:36]
A
You know, I think that you brought up a good point when you were talking about, and again you had mentioned it could probably apply to all seasons. Kids driving themselves, you know, do you have any type of waivers in place that allows student athletes to drive themselves? Do you have to have a waiver in place for student athletes to ride with another student athlete to venues or another parent of things like that? So you got to be cognizant of those things when it comes to transportation. Definitely keeping that at the forefront of your mind regardless of the season, particularly to your point, during the winter season you have so many venues that are not necessarily on your campus. I think that that's really important that you're being aware of that. Question for you, with, with so many off campus venues and you're talking about the bus perspective, communication to the campus community in terms of early dismissals to be able to arrive at practice on time, is that something you ever encountered?
- [12:30]
B
I mean, yes, like I think my swimming and ice hockey times, we did our best to push them to after school, but there were times when you had to get them out early. And that was, I would say, probably more prevalent in the winter as you bring it up. Obviously, like sometimes we would have like state tournament games at 4 o' clock and if it was A special game. We would get the kids out early and certainly that communication with like their teachers and the kids and parents and transportation was critically important, especially the teachers. Like sometimes kids were missing two, three of the same class. If you have that. If you don't have a rotating block schedule right at the end of the day and there's some hardship there for the kid and the teacher.
- [13:15]
A
Would you ever come across issues, I mean, looking at it through the, your, your historic lens from buses, you know, because you have all these venues that are off site, would it become a supply and demand issue in terms of being able to secure buses? Or was that something that was readily available on your end?
- [13:31]
B
Yeah, I mean, for me it wasn't always readily available. I think from. I got out in three years ago from the ad job and one of the biggest complaints that I hear from former colleagues, people still on the job, transportation. And it's gotten much more difficult over these last few years. So I can't imagine we didn't have a full fleet of dedicated buses. So like we sometimes had to shuttle kids. Like, hey, what was the closest venue? Let's bring that team, drop them, come back, get team two, get them to the further venue. So there was definitely a lot of logistical things to take care of there. You guys too?
- [14:10]
A
Yeah, I mean, very similar in that sense. You know, the, the, the one X factor every season, but especially during winter sports season, just because of the, the nature of venues and things like that. Was. Is the bus here? Are we on time? Are we going to be late? That was always one of the things that kept me really high strung because you did everything on your end, you scheduled it, but ultimately it's out of your hands. So yeah, there's, there's definitely a commonality there, regardless of where you're at in the country, I would assume.
- [14:39]
B
Think so, man. Think so. Like, what about health and safety protocols? You find there would be different health safety protocols in the winter than maybe the fall or the spring?
- [14:52]
A
I think the first one that sticks out again going back to the multiple venues, is being able to have an ATC present. You're not going to be able to have them present at every single venue. Right. So then it goes back to the shameless plug on our part. Emergency action plans. We got a great episode on it. Tune into that one. You can learn a little bit more about that. Ensuring that your coaches know what to do in the event of an emergency. Many of them are going to be off site. Do you have access readily available AEDs? Do you have traveling AEDs, things like that to keep in mind. But then one that stuck out to me because we encountered it almost every season. And I want to see if you kind of had the same issue, wrestling and hygiene issues in terms of like ringworm and things like that. That was one that was always making sure that things were properly cleaned following practices because that level of importance of something that could be highly contagious and spread relatively quickly.
- [15:48]
B
Yeah, I was a wrestler and a wrestling coach and gosh, it's a tough sport to keep all those skin diseases away. So 100% different. Right. With the mats and being inside, figuring out the right product to clean the mats with. Who's going to clean the product? Gosh, we would have the recreation department like come in right after the high school practices, usually on the same mats, who's cleaning them up afterwards. So for sure there's a difference there. And you know what, now that I said that, it brings me back to probably a previous question, um, which would be like facility wise, in the winter we tended to have a lot more of like the phys Ed versus after school sports, like equipment type of things to think about. So think about like those volleyball stanchions. If you had those and you had to roll those things out for volleyball in the winter, where'd those go during the winter season? Were they far enough off the court so that you could play a game safely? And like there, there tended to be a lot more of, like I said, those phys Ed and sports after school sports conflicts with the facility or the equipment. Something to think about too, 100%, you.
- [17:08]
A
Know, because like that, that brings me back to the exact scenario you're discussing. You know, we had multiple, not only just phys Ed, but we also had performing arts that, you know, maybe it was a dance team or something along those lines that were utilizing the gym. And there would always be the conflict of, well, basketball left it this way and it's not set up for us for class and then basketball, complaining that it's not set up for practice, et cetera. So yeah, definitely coming across some more unique scenarios when it comes to the venues during winter sports than you do in fall and spring. Because to your earlier point, you know, when you're talking about fall and spring sports, not all, but predominantly you're looking at field based sports. You know, like the, the football field is not going to get completely changed in terms of the ability to use it. You can go out there, you can have a football practice and immediately afterwards you can go through soccer, lacrosse, etcetera Obviously, there's some. Some nuances to some minor setup, but when you're looking at a gym setup, definitely something to be aware of. And then to your point as well, when you're talking about the mats, who's going to be taking care of them? Who's also going to be ensuring that proper footwear is on there so you're not having wear and tear and undue expenses just because of negligence by anybody's part. So certainly some things that you got to think about as you're preparing for.
- [18:29]
B
Those winter sports seasons, even I would always recommend spending a decent amount of time with the custodial staff who's there to set up. Because again, it's a setup. Like, it tends to be a lot different than the outdoor venues. You're setting up a gym for a basketball game or for a wrestling match. There tends to be like a group of people who come in to help you set that up. And like, having written plans for it, I think becomes important so that people can't say, I didn't know. But also spending that time and going over with, like, whoever that setup team is. And then I guess this probably applies to everything. But, like, what about cleanup afterwards? You know, communicating with your coaches that leaving the place of pigsty is not acceptable and it's not somebody's job to come in and clean up like water bottles and cups and stuff like that that your team just throws around after practice or after a game. Like, there should be some minimum expectations for what the kids and the team are responsible for, either in setup or in cleanup.
- [19:33]
A
I really like the point that you brought up in terms of just your facility staff, if you will. Right. Because that's something that you just jog my memory on, where we would have a weekly meeting with that team and it would be okay, you know, in the gym, the north bleachers are in from this time to this time. And then we need to have them pulled out for the. The JV game that begins at this time or, you know, day to day, letting them know, what did the bleacher setup look like? Because you're going to have contests. I mean, for us personally, from my perspective, from Tuesday through Saturday, there was almost always something going on, whether it was a home contest, practices, etc. And there was always the manipulation of the facility, if you will, and ensuring that, you know, maybe you had divider curtains that needed to be brought up and down, or you had stanchions that need to be rolled out, put in place for various contests. The bleacher piece was always a big one, making sure that it was communicated depending upon how many practices were taking place, what, what groups from within the campus outside of athletics were utilizing it? So those are all some really good points in terms of just ensuring those that are not necessarily directly in the athletic department, but are going to have a direct impact on how you operate are looped in.
- [20:46]
B
Right.
- [20:47]
A
Goes back to our, our theme of communication. So I think that's a really great point that you bring up from that standpoint. All right, so how do you think winter sports vary depending upon the region of the country that your school's in?
- [21:05]
B
Yeah, I mean, I think we talked about it a bunch. Listen, there's outdoor winter sports in some parts of the country in like, again, my experience in New Jersey is like, hey, can you get outside for track practice? Is there like a temperature threshold where your team can go for a long run in the wintertime if it's 32 degrees or below or, you know, above, like, there's. That's going to vary greatly across the country based on the geography, obviously, like, again, the snow and the cancellations and the early dismissals and like, those kind of things tend to vary. And obviously the sports that are offered can vary for wintertime across the country as well. How about yourself, Greg? Anything stand out?
- [21:56]
A
Yeah, I think one thing that always stood out to me was, you know, being in Southern California just kind of the, the rules that were in place, right. Because I would not only be juggling the winter sports, which, bluntly put, were the priority during winter season, we also had the ability for all the other sports on campus to have off season practice. So there was contact with their coaches during the off season. And then it became a matter of, of ensuring practice times and availability around the in season sports. So that was something that was always having to be juggled. And I used to jokingly and lovingly say that I was the no fun ad because it was yes or no answers in terms of venues. And there would be times of the year that you loved me as a coach because you were getting everything you wanted because you were in season. And then there was going to be times of the year where you're probably calling me some things that I shouldn't repeat on the podcast like this because you weren't getting the more advantageous time. So I think from a geographic standpoint, that was one thing that I think we encountered more frequently than others do throughout the country. But then to the flip side of that, you know, a lot of the weather issues that you all encountered. We weren't coming across that very frequently. You know, it would be kind of comical to say like, oh, it's too cold to practice and you're talking to somebody in the northeast and it's like, well, how's too cold? And it's like I was 55, you know, like. And people are like, no, you can get out there and do stuff, you know, so it's, it's definitely regionalized. And then also. Great point on your end. The varying sports that are offered during the winter season, you know, I know for myself, soccer was a big one during the winter season. You see other states where that's either a fall or spring sport. They may not be doing it in the winter because of weather concerns. Can't be getting out there when there's a foot of snow. Right. So there's definitely some intricacies depending upon the geographic region that you're sitting in, but things you have to be aware of and put thought towards as you're preparing for those seasons.
- [23:55]
B
Agreed, man, totally agree. Going back to facilities, did you have to? I mean maybe not your school, but I know a lot of schools have to like juggle between starting practice times and like, hey, I've got one gym and I've got six levels of basketball, three boys, three girls. And we've got to go like every other week early, late, that becomes an issue. But then what I also think that people deal with is what do you do with the kids who can't get home? Like girls basketball practice is late tonight because the boys are early. This kid can't get home and get back. So where does she go during the couple hours of time between school and when her practice starts? Any revs to deal with that?
- [24:46]
A
Absolutely. And I think that's a great point to bring up because many times we would deal with that, not only just for those in season sports, because we were fortunate in the sense that we had three functional courts. Right. So you had three courts that you could get those teams through. But we had multiple levels for every single gym sport. Right. So it's not like you were just given, hey, girls basketball carte blanche. That's still multiple levels you got to get through. And you've also got to take into consideration for the boys basketball team, wrestling, etc. So there was always that element of kind of slotted practice times, if you will. But then additionally too you had to think of going back to the mentioning of sport. Coaches could have essentially year round practices if you would like off season practices, kids are on campus Waiting for a six o' clock gym time, maybe. What are they doing in those hours between? And that's where we really developed like a study hall, if you would, and make sure that there was a supervision piece because those student athletes are still on campus. You've got to make sure that you're supervising them for their safety and well being. So we would implement those types of things where they had the option like they were either going to be leaving campus and coming back, or if they were remaining on campus, they had to be in designated areas where there was supervision to try and prevent any types of issues from taking place. How about you? How would you kind of juggle those types of scenarios?
- [26:08]
B
I mean, honestly, study halls, supervision, study halls is the way to go. Clearly study hall could be really important too because if they're starting practice late, when are they doing their homework, where's the opportunity if they need a computer? I mean, so many kids have like, you know, school issued laptops now and things. But bottom line, like a facility that would allow them to kind of do that and somebody there to supervise for safety reasons. Important.
- [26:36]
A
So a little off script here, but a question that just kind of popped in my mind. We've been focusing so much on the sport element and earlier in the episode you talked about, you know, whether it's winter concerts, winter formals, dances, things like that. How did you navigate those waters? Because that's certainly something that's going to come up for ads during that winter sports season.
- [26:54]
B
Yeah, I think I've said it before. Not. Well, I didn't. I didn't do as great of a job. Again, I say like for my choir and band directors. Sorry a lot. I put kids in the middle sometimes and I shouldn't have. Right. Like, hey, I've only got this night to have this game and we're having it. Or we'll get to the concert lead or we'll do this right. Just it was not the right way to approach it. So what do you go back to? Communication, priorities, understanding that kids want to do multiple things, not just the sport. And if there's a lot going on. And I guess that would also kind of lead you into those conversations about vacations.
- [27:37]
A
Yeah.
- [27:38]
B
And kids maybe having a choice, maybe not having a choice. Parents are going away, like what happens? What are the policies? Do you let your own coaches set a policy on that? Do you have a department wide policy on missing for vacations? There's one for you. Did you guys have one or the other?
- [28:00]
A
You know, for us it was individual sports that were kind of able to set the tone, obviously through the guidance of the athletic department. It wasn't just, you know, they had the authority to go in and determine, oh, you'll be president of everything. But there were certainly conversations because it varied by sport. We had some sports that they'd have a couple contests during the holiday seasons. They were non league contests and they were a little more lax, I guess, for lack of a better term, in terms of being able to come and go during that holiday season time. And then we had other sports that were doing traveling tournaments, you know, and you have to be really aware of what families are trying to do because you've got that holiday season that's right there in the middle of your season. So I think it goes back to ensuring that expectations are properly set and that there's an understanding that families are going to want to travel for holidays, they're going to do vacations. Additionally to your earlier point, you know, student athletes, we want them to be well rounded. We always preach that they may be participating in the choir, they may have to miss a practice or two to be able to do that. And making sure that your coaches have an understanding of that I think is a, is a big part of it, particularly when you're looking at the winter sports because there is so much overlap in that area.
- [29:13]
B
Yeah, I, I don't think there's a good answer on this one. You talk about coaches making a decision and then you've got a kid on two separate teams and one coach says it's fine to go away and the other coach says you can't go away. What do you do as a parent? Right. So like, do you set a department wide expectation? There are some programs that just naturally are more competitive. And like, anybody listening who hasn't heard the, the name Wally Pip can look up Wally Pip and say like, hey, I don't have a rule you can go away for vacation. It's just that when you come back, probably don't have a starting spot. And it's not even punishment. It's just that I had four other kids who were like nipping at your heels for your spot anyway. And you just open up an opportunity for some kids to come in and they did great while you were away and there's not a spot. You know, you're on the team and if you'll get some time, but you're not starting anymore or you lost some time because some other kid proved themselves. So like, I bring it up with the idea in mind that I don't have a good answer. It makes it. It is hard. But again, in the whole grand scheme of things, families having family time is pretty darn important. And I would always want to have coaches who understood that as part of, like, what we did.
- [30:35]
A
I think that's a great way of looking at it. And you just popped another question in my mind, because we're talking about, you know, how do you manage that holiday season and, you know, practice hours, etc. As an athletic director, how did you personally manage that? Because, you know, school's closed, but you got contests going on. You got a family that you want to be able to keep happy as well. How did you really kind of go about ensuring that you had a little bit of time to yourself to recharge during that time as well? Because it's real easy for ads to just work straight through that break because of the various holiday tournaments.
- [31:08]
B
Yeah, I mean, I think most do. And we talked a little bit earlier about maybe having an episode with principal and athletic director in terms of, like, that communication between the two and setting the expectations. And I think that's an important thing to do early on as an ad to carve out that time to not set the expectation that you're there for everything. Are there people that you can lean on to come in and help you out and supervise should you be, you know, going away over that break? You're entitled to it as well, right? Ads tend to be the only people in the building who are kind of expected to work over vacations a lot of times, which is just isn't fair. So again, if my wife was listening, she'd probably say I did a terrible job at balancing that, like, home and work life. But my advice as an older guy now would be figure it out early and let make sure people understand how it's important, how important it is for you to also have your family time.
- [32:08]
A
I would agree with you, and I think my wife would probably agree with your wife as well, in terms of not being the best of stepping away, but looking back on it. And as I got later in my career, I did a better job of it. Allowing yourself to designate other people to be the supervisor and you can have that family time and step away because you can't be there for everything or you're going to burn out really quickly because you've got stuff going on during the holiday seasons. Okay, well, yeah, I just got to be there for the holidays. Then you got stuff going on during spring break. Yeah, I got to be here just for spring break before you Know it. You hit summer and there's going to be various things taking place during summer. Like, well, I just got to be here for that. You've never had the chance to get away and recharge yourself, which we had an episode previously talking about the importance of taking care of you and making sure that you have that time away to recharge, regroup and not burn out quickly because of it. I think it is something you definitely have to think about, especially when you're going into the winter sports season because you have those holiday breaks. How are you going to manage that? Who are you going to designate as the point of contact for particular days? Can you have a rotating schedule where, you know, maybe one day it's the principal's in charge and they're on campus. If anything comes up, here's who you're going to contact or other staff members that are going to be designated that point person for particular days and communicating that in advance. I think that's an important element as you prepare for these winter sports.
- [33:32]
B
I would agree. And you know, we've said this before too. I think think about like athletic trainer. If you spread out all these things over things like breaks, hey, this team's coming in for practice at 8am, this team's coming in at noon. I've got games at 7pm still home on, on campus. Like, how is that fair to maybe an athletic trainer? Is there an expectation that they're there from 8am till 9 at night when normally they don't have to come in until lunchtime or whatever. Their normal like starting time is when they've got after school activities. So there's another group of people that ads, as they plan this kind of stuff out, have to be cognizant of as well.
- [34:17]
A
Absolutely. And that's a great point. I know from my personal experience we came across that exact scenario where you would have teams who are like, hey, I'm just going to hammer out practices in the morning, give them the day. And then there was teams that were playing that night or somebody coming in midday because we want to let the kids sleep in, etc. So then what we would do is we basically would set athletic training hours and then make sure that it was communicated to coaches. We're not saying you can't go outside of these times, but if you are, your emergency action plan is your bible. You need to make sure that you know that like the back of your hand. Because you're not going to have athletic training coverage because these are the designated hours and we'd have some coaches that were like, okay, I understand the emergency action plan. I want to make sure that I'm providing these times for my kids. This is what we're going to do. I had other coaches that were out of an abundance of caution, they'd be like, nope, we're going to go there in the times when the trainers are here, you know. So it certainly is something that you got to communicate and that's a very important topic that you have to have buttoned up as you go into these winter sports seasons.
- [35:14]
B
Yeah, agreed. So many things to talk about. How about technology? There's one. Anything different technology wise, would you say in the winter? Let me throw a thesis to you and you respond. Digital ticketing, live streaming, facility management are as important or more important in the winter than in the fall?
- [35:43]
A
That's a good question. You know, I would say facility management is always going to be one that's year round of importance. But I would say during the winter facility management became difficult. For me personally. The. The it depended upon the facility that we were looking at, right? If it was the quote unquote football field during fall, that was the difficult one to manage. Right. We had a smaller footprint of a campus, if you will. Winter sports, the facility, obviously it's the gym, right? That was the difficult piece of it. And then we were fortunate enough to have a pool on campus while you've got in season girls, water polo going on, swim seasons on deck for spring, kind of juggling that. So that was the facility management piece. I'd say from the digital ticketing perspective, year round it was of importance. But your two heaviest seasons utilizing it would be the fall and the winter less so during the spring just because the way our outdoor venues were set up for baseball and softball, if you will. The streaming element though is really critical because you have the opportunity. Again, people may be traveling, they want to be able to catch the contests that are taking place. Offering that live stream option is critical because you have folks that are going to be all over the country. You know, it may be that they're traveling to see loved ones. I think that it's a very useful tool to have because you have so many contests taking place. And when you're doing those holiday tournaments, let's take the travel element out of it. You know, not everybody's going to be able to have that two week break of a window for the holidays. You might have your kid playing on the JV team in the JV tournament and their game tips off at 11am you can't skip work because of it. But maybe you can check the live stream occasionally. So I think that there's a high demand for the streaming element of it. Definitely some uniqueness when it comes to the winter sports from that perspective. But how about you? What are your thoughts on that?
- [37:37]
B
I mean, I think if I think about ticketing, the only thing that would stand out to me would maybe be like limited capacity for the indoor events at times. Right. Like probably better chance of having to do that or sellouts for an indoor facility just being smaller than an outdoor facility. So that'd be the only difference I could really think of indoors versus outdoors for live streaming. I agree with you. Plus again, if you start adding in things like the elements and poor weather in certain parts of the country, having that live stream up because I don't want to venture out necessarily in questionable weather. Maybe the game's happening, but I don't want to get there. I don't want to jump in the car. Maybe live streaming becomes a little more important at times because of that as well. And then facility wise, like for me, yeah, facility stuff, like you just have limited space in the winter, it seems to me. So being able to have facility scheduling software, something that's easily accessible, something that prevents you from having double booked facilities becomes just as important or more in the winter. I'll probably say the same thing in the spring, by the way.
- [38:52]
A
Yeah, well, I think too another point of that is like we're focusing on the winter season and the regular season. Just preparation. I think the other thing you got to take into consideration not only for your facilities, but just overall logistical management. When you get to postseason, are you prepared? Because basketball, and in my case soccer as well, you had games where you were playing, like either Wednesday, Fridays, Tuesday, Thursday. Some weeks it would be Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday. You didn't know if you needed a bus or if you needed to have game management, personnel, etc. Lined up. Are you hosting? Are you on the road? Those are all things especially too during the winter that I saw more so than I would in the fall. And then again, obviously in the spring it was as bad, if not worse with that because of the magnitude and volume of sports you had, but certainly something you've got to prepare and plan for as well. Like for me it was always making sure knowing those particular playoff dates of hey, there is a potential we could be hosting a game on this and ensuring that other departments on campus were aware of. I'm not going to know until said date if we're hosting or not. But I got to reserve this now. You know what I mean?
- [40:00]
B
For sure.
- [40:03]
A
Well, awesome. I. I think that we covered a lot of topics. Any. Any final thoughts before we wrap this episode? Scott?
- [40:11]
B
Now, we also did an episode on preseason meetings. So like, just throwing in, obviously now is the time to start thinking about your preseason meetings, obviously hiring people and making sure you've got that in place. If you do. Well, everybody's got to do registration for sports, so making sure that if you're using an online registration system, you've got those forms up and just about ready to go as you open that up for your, for your community. Anything else from your perspective?
- [40:38]
A
I think that that really kind of hits on all, all fronts. You know, it's always great catching up with you and kind of talking through the various challenges that were maybe unique to our prior roles or the commonalities between them. But with that said, that's going to wrap this episode on winter sports and it's going to be here before we know it. So ads, we certainly encourage you to begin planning now because it's going to approach us much more rapidly than we think as fall sport playoffs are just around the corner. And in closing, if you liked what you heard today, stay tuned for future episodes. Make sure you follow us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast from so you don't miss any new episodes. And in closing, from A.D. 360, I'm Greg Vandermade.
- [41:22]
B
And I'm Scott Rosenberg. Thanks, guys.
- [41:24]
A
Until next time.