Wednesday, October 21, 2020 • The Mitchell Republic • 11
Prep Football Playoff Preview
EXPECT A BUMPIER ROAD TO THE DOME THIS YEAR COVID-19 likely will have its say on SD’s state football bracket
The road to the Dome. That’s the way MARCUS many South DakoTRAXLER Assisstant ta high school football Editor teams like to look at the playoffs each year, the pinnacle of a prep football career. There will be roadBut in 2020, not every blocks. And it’s because team is going to have of COVID-19. a smooth road to get South Dakota’s teams forged ahead with a to Vermillion.
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football season relatively close to normal this season. Not much was changed about how the games were administered or how teams approached their contests when they were able to play. But dozens of games have been called off during the regular season, and given South
Dakota’s coronavirus case count continues to quickly trend upward, this will be a playoffs unlike any other. There is a real chance that there will be a forfeit that impacts the playoff bracket and ends a team’s season, if the team cannot play. That is one of the many
consequences of playing during a pandemic. Whether one thinks South Dakota should have played football in a pandemic is now immaterial. The state’s high schools did it, and we’ve seen the results. Four classes concluded their regular seasons on Oct. 16, and one-third of the teams in those divi-
sions did not play a complete schedule of at least eight games this season. It did not go perfectly, and that was expected. And nobody should expect perfection in the playoffs either. That’s what South Dakota signed on for when it forged ahead.
DOME: Page 12
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