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Prep Zone: High School Sports

GHSA adjusts basketball rules due to weather conditions

2:45 pm January 11, 2010, by Michael Carvell

The state’s high school basketball teams caught a break on Monday from the Georgia High School Association.
Due to the large number of postponed games due to icy conditions last weekend, the sport’s governing body has waived the rule specifying that only one game may be played on a school night each week. It’s an effort to keep on pace for the first round of the playoffs, which are scheduled for Feb. 26-27.
“At this late stage in the game, many schools are already have just about every Tuesday, Friday and Saturday booked up, and most are region games,” GHSA executive director Ralph Swearngin said.
Several metro counties postponed athletic events last Friday and Saturday, while Swearngin said that some other schools along the state’s northern border are contemplating moving back basketball games scheduled for Tuesday, also due to icy conditions.
However, the temporary change of the rule comes with exception: The schools still have to abide to the “100 mile rule,” meaning they can’t travel more than 100 miles one way on a school night for competition.
“Most of the people affected by the snow and ice are in North Georgia, where the schools are much closer,” Swearngin said. “You would more likely to see that come into play in South and Central Georgia, and they didn’t get hit as badly by the weather.”

The state’s high school basketball teams caught a break on Monday from the Georgia High School Association.

Due to the large number of postponed games due to icy conditions last weekend, the sport’s governing body has waived the rule specifying that only one game may be played on a school night each week. It’s an effort to keep on pace for the first round of the playoffs, which are scheduled for Feb. 26-27.

“At this late stage in the game, many schools are already have just about every Tuesday, Friday and Saturday booked up, and most are region games,” GHSA executive director Ralph Swearngin said.

Several metro counties postponed athletic events last Friday and Saturday, including the highly-anticipated showdown between the No. 1-ranked Milton boys and No. 3 Centennial of Class AAAAA. The teams are talking about making it up on Sat., Feb. 6.

“I think that’s great when the GHSA does things to help out the schools, and also act so quickly,” Milton coach David Boyd said.

Several schools along the state’s northern border are contemplating moving back basketball games scheduled for Tuesday due to icy conditions, according to Swearngin.

However, the temporary change of the rule comes with exception: The schools still have to abide to the “100 mile rule,” meaning they can’t travel more than 100 miles one way on a school night for competition.

“Most of the people affected by the snow and ice are in North Georgia, where the schools are much closer,” Swearngin said. “You would more likely to see that come into play in South and Central Georgia, and they didn’t get hit as badly by the weather.”

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4 comments Add your comment

Asheville Dawg

January 11th, 2010
3:34 pm

first somewhere

Asheville Dawg

January 11th, 2010
3:35 pm

Glad the GHSA is thinking rationally for once.

G'Vegas Dawg

January 12th, 2010
7:57 am

Now if they would just quit turning a blind eye to recruiting amongst high school programs they would be on to something….

Metro Coach

January 12th, 2010
9:59 am

While we’re dealing with stupdi rules, how about we get rid of the “mercy rule” in varsity competition. They could also think about changing the 25 game schedule so that tournaments only count as 1 date as opposed to counting each individual game. GHSA needs to re-think a lot of their misguided rules and regulations.