ORONO – The University of Maine cleared its spring athletic teams for competition on Friday morning.
With the spring schedule release coming several weeks ago, traditional spring teams, as well as temporary ones, have been practicing in anticipation for their upcoming seasons. Football, field hockey, cross country and soccer all had their seasons pushed to the spring this past fall. Soccer will be the first team to open up its slate as the team heads south to play Merrimack on Sunday.
There is plenty of excitement towards playing games, but so far practicing through the Maine winter has created some challenges. UMaine soccer Head Coach Scott Atherely anticipates those hurdles may show themselves in the first couple games.
“All of those things are going to have to be considerations on top of the tactical things that we’re paying attention to, the strategic things, so there’s going to be a big kind of performance curve that we’re anticipating certainly for the first few games,” Atherley said.
While soccer is set to open up its season this coming weekend, field hockey will play its first game on Feb. 28 at Northeastern.
Football is scheduled to begin its CAA campaign on March 6 at Delaware.
As for the traditional spring sports, baseball open with a series at Central Connecticut State University on Feb. 26, while softball will play at Army on March 6.
