With the Allen Community College soccer season just weeks away, ACC Athletic Director Doug Desmarteau said the college continues looking for a solution for a quality field surface at the soccer fields.
Allen’s field surface issues are no different than what many teams experience throughout the season with near immaculate field conditions slowly devolving by the end.
“It’s been Bermuda for a long time, prior to me getting here, so at least 25 years,” Desmarteau said. “Bermuda is a hot season grass, so it goes dormant at the end of the fall season and remains dormant until April or May.”
Desmarteau said brutal winters the past few years exacerbated Allen’s deteriorating field conditions. Instead of going through a winter growth cycle, harsh winters make Bermuda grass go dormant or even die.
“The last two years, we’ve had such a hard winter that Bermuda is susceptible to winter kill,” Desmarteau said. “If it gets really cold, and there is not a lot of moisture in the grass, it will kill it. If we tried to flip it over to a different type of grass, more of a cold season grass, then you’re trying to plant grass when you’re trying to play and there is not really another option for playing a home game during the regular season.”
While NFL fields begin to look a bit rugged by December with a complete, round-the-clock staff of turf specialists, Allen Community College does not have that luxury. Along with providing a place to play on game day, the fields must also serve as a practice field for the teams, as well as fields for multiple area youth and high school teams.
“It gets a lot of use with both the men’s and women’s programs playing out there, plus a JV program, plus the home school team plays some games,” Desmarteau said. “It gets a lot of use. It’s frustrating, but it’s still cheaper than putting artificial turf in there. That would be a lot more expensive.”
Desmarteau said the school explored practicing in other locations on campus, but by doing so the soccer teams only shift their sod issue to other sports teams because the baseball, softball and track and field teams use different grasses which grow during their respective offseasons.
“Hopefully, we can get a practice field,” Desmarteau said. “Taking some of the practice off of the field will help, we just don’t have any spaces that are irrigated. Once they practice there for a few weeks, it just becomes dirt.”
Until then, the college will use a few tried and true methods for keeping the soccer field grass thicker throughout the year. However, they may need Mother Nature to ease up a bit after the soccer season wraps up in late October.
“We had to re-sprig it, and it looks good right now,” Desmarteau said. “At the end of the season, we’re going to try a few things we have done — keep it a little longer and we may insulate it a little better. We’ll also try to put a top dressing over it in sand to insulate it.”
