The last few days in Pennsylvania have been an extended holiday.
In addition to the actual Thanksgiving holiday the following two days – one nationally and one in Pennsylvania – are basically the unofficial holidays of Black Friday and the first day of Buck season.
But in 2024, those “holidays” will be interrupted by the first weekend of winter sports in the PIAA unless the organization makes a change to its current sports calendar.
According to the PIAA “Schedule of Sports’ Events“, the first day of play for Winter Sports for the 2024-25 sports season is Friday, Nov. 29. Thanksgiving Day in 2024 is Thursday, Nov. 28.
That means that all those tip-off basketball tournaments and wrestling tournaments that everyone is so used to seeing will fall on Black Friday and the first day of Buck season in Pennsylvania.
Add that to AAA estimating that over 55 million people or a little over 16% of the entire county was expected to travel over 50 miles or more for Thanksgiving in 2023 making it one of the busiest travel days, weekends the entire year and one can easily see how things could be impacted next year.
Of course, some schools may choose not to hold tournaments that weekend, but some will just out of tradition or necessity.
But the real question is, why should any school, coach, or AD even be put in that position?
For one year, the PIAA should move its start of Winter sports back a week.
Sure, that would create an 11-week regular season instead of a 12-week regular season but is that really a big deal? Until last year, for over a decade, there was only an 11-week regular season. So going back to one wouldn’t be that big of a deal.
And the benefits would be great.
Families of athletes wouldn’t be worried about traveling to see loved ones. School administrators wouldn’t be worried about balancing two very distinct traditions – Thanksgiving weekend and opening-season events – at the same time, and athletes themselves wouldn’t be forced to make decisions that they shouldn’t be forced to make at that time of year.
Sure, a select few football programs have to play Friday or Saturday night of Thanksgiving weekend but that’s a reward for those teams as they are deep into the postseason which is very different than starting a season.
This is an easy fix but it is a fix that should be done soon because schools will soon know their new PIAA classifications and schedules for the 2024-25 Winter sports season will follow shortly after.
The problem is, there doesn’t seem to be much chatter at the PIAA level about this issue. It was brought up in a District 9 committee meeting a couple of months ago, and a few media members have also raised the issue but overall it doesn’t seem to have gained much traction in areas where it needs to gain traction.
Or, perhaps, there just aren’t as many people who see this as an issue.
