“It’s a bummer,” Burbank first-year Coach Hector Valencia said. “You can go out and walk on the new field, but we haven’t been allowed to practice on it yet. We were really looking forward to breaking in our new field.”
Burbank hasn’t been able to practice at all because of the conditions.
“We can’t even go through our plays in the gym,” he said. “They won’t let us.”
Missing practices has been a major setback for Burbank, which opens the season at 7 p.m. Friday in a nonleague Zero Week game at Simi Valley.
Valencia said despite the setback, he expects his team to be ready for its opener Friday.
“We have just been working on the mental aspects of our game,” he said. “But everything has been positive with the players and they have a great attitude.
“This is a team that doesn’t’ get down on itself. These guys are determined to have a successful season and they are working hard toward that goal.”
Valencia, a Burbank graduate and former football standout, takes over a program that had its ups and downs last season.
Although the football team went 6-6 and just made the playoffs after finishing in a three-way tie for fourth place in the Pacific League, it stepped up in the playoffs.
In its Southeast Division opener, coach Ted Amorosi’s group upset second-seeded Santa Fe, 20-14, on the road. It was the program’s first postseason win in 81 years.
The team fell in the quarterfinals to West Covina, 49-28.
Hoping to get back to the playoffs, and hopefully compete for a Pacific League title, Valencia will be relying on an offense that lost its most productive weapon to graduation.
