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Save Our Sports succeeds; new SCL

Open field

When the fallout from world-wide economic woes finally seeped into the Valley and the recent budget cuts led to the cancellation of all the middle school sports programs, an urgent SOS led to keeping alive the athletic participation of our youth at both Adele Harrison and Altimira middle schools.

First, the SOS stands for Save Our Sports, which is the name of the Valley vital sports-saving fundraiser that was organized back in May to raise money to keep the sports programs going at Adele and Altimira.

Second, the Save Our Sports middle-schools adults-only fundraiser took place at Larson Family Winery and turned into a successful event which reached its goal of saving basketball, soccer, track, volleyball and wrestling at Sonoma’s two middle schools.

Major kudos to all the SOS organizers, participants and any and all of those who pulled together to, again, show the strength of our Valley community in helping our youth to learn, grow and be well-rounded adults who understand what caring-people-power is all about.

 

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After decades of annual league battles, Sonoma Valley High School is no longer competing against Casa Grande (Petaluma) and Windsor high schools in Sonoma County League action.

Along with the recent start to the 2012 fall sports season comes the new realignment of both the SCL and the North Bay League, with Windsor and longtime rival Casa having switched from the SCL to the NBL for all sports on the growth basis of their student bodies, with Piner and Elsie Allen having moved to the SCL.

The other day I realized I was looking at a Dragons’ schedule from last year, instead of 2012, and didn’t know I had made a mistake because I looked at it and saw Casa and Windsor on it and didn’t pay any attention at first, until I realized I was suppose to see new SCL members Elsie Allen and Piner.

Sometimes there’s truth to the saying, “You can’t teach an old dog new tricks,” because this dog already reacted to seeing the names “Casa” and “Windsor” and forgetting they’re not Sonoma’s SCL foes anymore, and it’s time to turn the competitive attention to Elsie Allen and Piner.

It’s definitely still going to take some time to get used to the new SCL/NBL realignment – and we’ll miss some great showdowns between the Dragons and Casa’s Gauchos and Windsor’s Jaguars in multi-sporting events.

But, along with creating new rivalries with Elsie’s Lobos and Piner’s Prospectors, there’s still formidable longtime SCL foes to gear up for in all sports on a school-year-round basis in the Petaluma Trojans, Healdsburg Greyhounds, Analy Tigers and El Molino Lions.

So with the Labor Day holiday weekend ending last night, let the games begin … Oh, that’s right, they already have over the past two weeks of August, which is another change we need to make.

It used to be that, after spending part of June recuperating from the previous school year, the months of July and August were for summer family fun, whether at home or on vacations. Not any more. But this is a different subject for another time.

Now is the time to start observing how the smaller-enrollment SCL, and the larger-schooled NBL, changes will, or maybe will not, affect the dynamics of the two leagues.

The changes will definitely be felt. But in the end, what really matters is providing healthy and character-building team competition for all our kids – whether in high school, or in our middle schools.

Ciao!