Weather likely to impact high school games played Friday
Published 6:45 pm Wednesday, November 4, 2015
By Justin Fedich | The Selma Times-Journal
The Keith Bears football team has a tough challenge against one-loss Georgiana, but the Bears could be up against another challenge Friday.
According to Mark Linhares of the National Weather Service in Birmingham, there is roughly a 50 percent chance of heavy rain and thunderstorms Friday night for Keith’s playoff game at Georgiana. The Alabama Sports Writers Association has reported 56 playoff games around the state that have already been moved to Thursday night due to weather concerns.
Dallas County’s playoff game at Greenville is one of the games that has been rescheduled.
“Both schools kind of felt like it was in the best interest of playing it on Thursday instead of waiting for Friday, have a lightning delay and have to be done by 12 o’ clock and then trying to come back on Saturday and the weather forecast for Saturday is not any better,” said Dallas County head coach Marty Smith.
“Then, you can’t play on Sunday so you’ve got to move it to Monday, so you’re playing two playoff games in a week.”
Linhares said there is no chance of rain Thursday night, so it makes sense for a multitude of teams to reschedule their games a day earlier.
While Keith’s game has a chance of being delayed, it isn’t a sure thing.
Georgiana is about an hour and 10 minutes south of Selma. Linhares said there’s a possibility the Keith game won’t face lightning delays.
“It should rain up there, it just depends on just how far south that stuff drifts Friday and Friday night,” Linhares said.
While Auburn is on the road this weekend, the Alabama Crimson Tide host the LSU Tigers at 7 p.m. on CBS.
Linhares said the weather shouldn’t play as much of a factor in that game, since the weather is expected to clear up as day turns to night Saturday.
“As we head into the weekend for the college football games, it looks like during the daytime hours, it should be raining across a good chunk of Central Alabama including…Tuscaloosa,” Linhares said. “Rain chances gradually diminish during the evening hours.”